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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29132679">Don't Dip Your Pen</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/cbstrike/pseuds/cbstrike'>cbstrike</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Feels, Bad Decisions, Drama, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Feelings, Introspection, Messy, Pain, Trouble In Paradise, Workplace Relationship</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-05-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 06:48:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>19,572</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29132679</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/cbstrike/pseuds/cbstrike</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>In a tiny office along Denmark Street, two people try to answer the age-old question: is it or is it not a good idea to date a co-worker?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kerenza (Cormoran Strike)/Cormoran Strike, Robin Ellacott &amp; Cormoran Strike, Robin Ellacott/Cormoran Strike, Sam Barclay &amp; Robin Ellacott</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>202</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>117</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Cormoran</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Cormoran Strike fancied a walk that fine afternoon, thinking he was iron-willed enough (at least that moment) to walk past the stalls and not buy a cigarette.</p><p class="p1">He’s been experimenting with quitting lately, getting his usual number of cigarettes down to about half. There was no science to it. Or if there was, he hadn’t investigated it. He was going about it like a diet. Doing portion control. The thought of going cold turkey was only making him crave smoking as many cigarettes he could fit in his mouth.</p><p class="p1">So far, some days were better than others. Today was an exceptionally good day as it was right after lunch and he’s yet to smoke one.</p><p class="p1">Maybe he just smoked his last cigarette, he thinks, his feet taking him to busy cobblestone streets full of tourists and families having a day of afternoon shopping.</p><p class="p1">He made a heel turn to go in the other direction, as though he didn’t at all mean to be anywhere near ice cream shops and candy stores and a theatre where excitable children and harangued families were already queueing for a matinee of <em>Matilda</em> at half past twelve.</p><p class="p1">And then he saw it, from the corner of his eye. A shade of blonde hair he’d recognise anywhere.</p><p class="p1">She was inside a brightly teal-coloured dessert cafe. In a spaghetti strapped floral sundress that bared the most skin he’s ever seen her.</p><p class="p1">She was in profile, and her dimple grooved into her cheek when she laughed. He grinned at this, thinking Robin in her off-hours like this was a revelation.</p><p class="p1">He took one step closer, intending to say hello. Wondering if she’ll be as thrilled to see him when she didn’t expect it, even when they already spent nearly half of their lives together.</p><p class="p1">And then he stopped short. Taking in the rest of the view before him. She had leaned a bit further, modestly covering her chest as she did so. She had been whispered to, and Cormoran spotted a small pudgy hand pointing at something on the table.</p><p class="p1">Robin seemed to oblige and Cormoran watched as she forked a bite of cake and fed it to a toddler.</p><p class="p1">So she was with a friend, he considered. Of course she was with someone. She’d been laughing just a moment ago.</p><p class="p1">She did it again. Laughed. A giggle. Her dimples grooving her cheek. And then she took another bite of the cake.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran knew the moment the fork seemed to disappear into the wall eye-level from Robin. He knew he ought to look away, but he was frozen in place, as though some unseen god of torture had shackled him on that raucous, over bright street to watch.</p><p class="p1">Robin moved, her back to his view now. The unknown little girl taking the spot she vacated, allowed free reign of her chocolate cake. The man had moved infinitesimally closer to her now, too. His toned, unfat arms moving, Robin moving a little to give it space around her. Cormoran could just see how the tip of the man’s thumb rubbed at the skin of Robin’s arm and he felt as though something stabbed him in the gut.</p><p class="p1">Why he still hadn’t left, he didn’t know. Did he want to be seen? Maybe. He was visible right outside. If he could see them clearly, they could see him just as clearly.</p><p class="p1">Robin turned to the man, smiled at him again. And when she cupped his cheek and initiated a kiss, he fell right past jealousy and heartbreak and straight into anger.</p><p class="p1">As if on cue, he had regained control of his remaining foot and the half a leg that controlled his prosthesis and walked away.</p><p class="p1">He patted his pockets and was unsurprised to find the last of his battered cigarettes and a zippo with just one spark left for him to light it. He look such a long drag he nearly finished the stick, lasting long enough for him to reach the nearest stall to buy three packs, one cigarette he lit in front of the merchant, and set off to the pub.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Cormoran had excellent memory. It was a point of pride with him, in fact. But right now, at this moment he couldn’t recall the name of the very beautiful (but very loud) woman currently under him.</p><p class="p1">It was a place, he knew. He remarked on it when he asked for her name at the bar. London? He wondered. Paris? Dallas? Berlin? Brooklyn?</p><p class="p1">“Cam! Ohhh!” she blurted as he thrusted, and he knew she’d already forgotten that his name was ‘kind of like Cameron, but not’, and he felt a little less guilty that he wasn’t sure if her name was Lima, or Sydney, or Mecca.</p><p class="p1">Is it Mecca?</p><p class="p1">She’s East Asian, he remembered that much. Lapsed Muslim, she said so herself. Jesus fuck, Strike! Fucking focus!</p><p class="p1">Adelaide? He thought, grunting. Rio? Grunt. Maui? Grunt. France? Grunt. Ireland? Grunt. India? Grunt.</p><p class="p1">Charlotte is a place, his evil brain thought. No!</p><p class="p1">The woman whose name might be China or Chicago stopped, panting, eyes flying open to look at him. “What’s wrong?”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran supposed he spoke out loud, and stopped moving, too. “Nothing,” he assured her, resuming what he was doing. Georgia? Siene? River? Is it River?</p><p class="p1">Rome? Grunt. Milan? Grunt. Verona? Grunt. Venice? Grunt. Venetia?</p><p class="p1">Venetia.</p><p class="p1">His elbow seemed to give out, and he fell on top of the woman whose name definitely, definitely isn’t inspired by that certain honeymoon destination.</p><p class="p1">He knew immediately that this had gone as far as it was going to, and he pulled himself out and off and rolled on his back, inwardly feeling as unsatisfied and frustrated as Vienna or Jordan who had yelled “Oh, for fuck’s sake!” and took over where he couldn’t finish. He made to try and make up for his error, but she had recoiled rather abruptly, turning her back to him in a huff and he heaved himself to sitting, pulling his leg back on and dressing as swiftly as possible.</p><p class="p1">The moment the cold night air hit his face, he remembered: it was Juneau.</p><p class="p1">It might have been the very worst sex of his life, and it was entirely his fault.</p><p class="p1">He tried not to think about what Robin would be doing right now, tried not to imagine her naked and sublime with him between her legs, his fingers permitted to touch where Cormoran never would.</p><p class="p1">He groaned, utterly displeased that there were no more pubs open where he was walking. He craved alcohol like a thirsty man lost in the desert. He was currently barely sober, but even that made his mind too clear, his feelings currently unprotected, and bare, and devastated.</p><p class="p1">He preferred that day’s earlier feelings of anger. Of betrayal that had him propositioning the first woman he saw at the pub.</p><p class="p1">The ease in which he was able to talk that woman into inviting him back to her flat had been gratifying earlier that night when he had been belligerently drunk. She, too, might have been just as drunk, the way it didn’t seem to register to her that he’s only got one leg.</p><p class="p1">In hindsight, that casual shag hadn’t been proof of any magnetism. Not really. They had been each other’s last resort.</p><p class="p1">On top of everything else, he now felt bad about how he behaved towards that woman whose name was a place that now escapes him. Dully, he hoped that she understood that he, too, felt lonely and heartsick and desperate as she might’ve been.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">If Nick and Ilsa ever split up, and he was made to choose which of them he’ll remain friends with, he wouldn’t need a second: he’ll pick Ilsa.</p><p class="p1">People think it’s Nick because he’s the bloke, and they get on very well, but at their wedding, he had been Best Man to Ilsa, not Nick.</p><p class="p1">And Cormoran thought this as he saw his old friend walking into the pub he slurred, still open because the barkeep was skittish and his last patron of the night was large and determined to be drunk.</p><p class="p1">“Did you know she was seeing someone?” he asked without preamble, perfectly aware he was tipping his hand. She must have an idea this is why she was summoned. That he wanted her alone for this. Because otherwise, she might’ve brought Nick.</p><p class="p1">“Oh, Oggy.” she said, sounding utterly sorry for him.</p><p class="p1">He lifted his heavy head from his pint. Even lifting his eyes to look at Ilsa was an effort. But looking at her, she looked nearly as wretched as he felt.</p><p class="p1">Ilsa only sighed. “She has mentioned it,” she said. She wasn’t looking at him, which was rare for Ilsa who could stare down a hungry lionness. “A few days ago... but I haven’t seen you in a week—!” she protested pleadingly as though she had betrayed him somehow by not telling him straight away.</p><p class="p1">It helped (a very little bit) to know that Ilsa was on his side.</p><p class="p1">“Besides, I don’t think it’s very serious. She’s only been on the one date!”</p><p class="p1"><em>Two</em> now, he thought. That afternoon had been the second, then. And it didn’t look like it’ll be the last. He wondered if they were still together. He wondered if he was in her bed now. If they were lying together, skin on sweaty skin.</p><p class="p1">Ilsa was babbling bracing words of assurances and Cormoran suspected Robin hadn’t told her a piece of key information.</p><p class="p1">“…and from what she told me, she isn’t really sure if it’ll go anywhere—”</p><p class="p1">He cut her off then, and she gasped in surprise and shock when he asked, “Did you know that it’s Sam?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Robin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Robin Ellacott had no idea Sam liked her in any way other than friend and colleague up until about half a second before what she initially considered as casual work drinks had ended.</p><p class="p1">It happens almost regularly, the casual work drinks. Always on a Thursday, some combination of the agency would be represented in a booth at the Tottenham. That afternoon, it had been the two partners with their subcontractors spitballing some ideas about a case. When the chitchat had grown more informal, more personal, Robin rang Pat to join them for a quick drink.</p><p class="p1">The group was quick to taper out though, everyone else had places they needed to be later that evening except for Robin and Sam, who stayed put.</p><p class="p1">It hadn’t been the first time they were left alone together or anything. They’ve done a lot of stakeouts together by then, grabbed drinks just the two of them. She considered him a friend. A pal. She didn’t think she was closer friends with Sam than she was with Andy, or Nick Herbert, for example.</p><p class="p1">She brought up his daughter, Maisie, and Sam’s usual jokey-blokey demeanour changed. He was currently at it with his ex-wife who wanted to move back to Scotland and raise Maisie there. And she listened, and was sympathetic to him. They’ve had some of these before, in the past. Heart-to-hearts, maybe, you would call it. He told her about Aileen coming out to him, and she felt for her friend who seemed to have had the rug pulled under him because of it.</p><p class="p1"><em>“Whit dae ye say tae that, ye know?”</em> he had said, sad and resigned. She couldn’t imagine. Her own marriage had ended very conventionally in terms of cause for divorce. She was sorry he had this going on the same time they were all particularly swamped by so much work on top of the Bamborough case. He hadn’t said anything. He only worked. She only ended up asking about his wife sometime after her birthday when he didn’t bring her to dinner.</p><p class="p1">But divorce does kind of bond you somewhat to other divorced people in your circle. It brought its own unique kind of pain and shame and irony that no one else really understood. And unlike Saul Morris, she considered Sam a kindred spirit.</p><p class="p1">They just talked and talked and Robin had gasped intensely when she realised it was 10 pm. Which explained why her arse was a little numb from sitting so long. She and Sam shared an Uber because their homes were roughly in the same direction. She didn’t think much of it when he also got off when she did. But was a little bewildered when he bothered to walk her to her stoop.</p><p class="p1">She had waved, said “Bye,” turning away with her hands deep in her bag to fish for the keys. He did suddenly lurch, hand brushing her elbow and she stopped digging and looked at him, supposing he might have something else to say.</p><p class="p1">But then he was only standing there in front of her in the sidewalk. Fists in the pocket of his jacket a little awkwardly, which made her laugh. “What is it, Sam?”</p><p class="p1">He grinned. A sheepish sort that Robin would later realise she found handsome on him.</p><p class="p1">“Uh, just…” he said and leaned over to press cheek to hers.</p><p class="p1">“Oh,” she said, still not thinking much of this. This was not the first time they’d air kiss like this. So she propped her cheeks for it. But he stopped centimeters away from her skin. Paused for only a split second. But that split second had been enough for something important to finally dawn on Robin: that at some point tonight, something had changed.</p><p class="p1">The light, almost inconsequential feel of his lips against her cheek had confirmed it. He stepped back immediately, the both of them blustering goodbyes, Sam getting back in the Uber. It was an age before Robin found her damn keys, desperate to get inside, for some privacy to think.</p><p class="p1">The Uber left as soon as she closed the front door.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Things were kind of normal after that. Casual work drinks. One-on-one meetings. Late-night surveillance. There was nothing in Sam’s behavior towards her that she would consider out of line. Or even different from how he usually was.</p><p class="p1">Except, it was like a seed had been planted.</p><p class="p1">Like suddenly, she was seeing him differently. Nothing too crazy. More of like, he’s always in snug jumpers or t-shirts that gave the overall impression of a fit and, dare she thought it, attractive person. But not like in a pompous way like Matthew or Morris. He was of course, not as pretty as either of those two, but he was definitely charming when you get to know him. And his accent. She never really noticed it before—he’s always saying something outrageous to get a laugh—but it was <em>not unpleasant</em>.</p><p class="p1">“Listen,” he started as he braked in front of Robin’s house. They’d just spent the entire night in Sam’s car watching another rich white guy sleeping around a wife already too young and too beautiful for him to begin with. “Are ye intae music, perchance?”</p><p class="p1">Robin couldn’t suppress the laughter that came out of her at the question. “Yes,” she had said in laughter, and it registered to Robin how she liked how he laughed at making her laugh. “I like music.”</p><p class="p1">“A got a mate who’s in a band an’ they’re playin’ The Old Blue Last tomorrow night.” he said. “I ask’d Pat an’—”</p><p class="p1">Robin laughed again.</p><p class="p1">“—she turn’d me doun, so…”</p><p class="p1">She pulled a somber face, patting him on the shoulder. “Tough luck,” she frowned at his misfortune. When she withdrew her hand, he took it in his and Robin felt like someone had put heart paddles over her chest and gave it a good jolt. But she withdrew it gently, using it to tuck her hair behind her ear, imagining her emotions like debris stuffed in an overflowing closet, and she had her back against it to keep it from spilling out.</p><p class="p1">He was still looking expectantly at her. Smilingly. She shrugged, but then nodded, also smiling. “Yeah, I think I’d like that.”</p><p class="p1">The way he smiled, she could’ve kissed him. (She didn’t though.)</p><p class="p1">They lingered for a few more seconds, just smiling at each other, before Robin got out of the car and went inside her house.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">“Nice jacket!” Michelle beamed at the leather jacket Robin wore over plain t-shirt and jeans that next morning. She’s had that jacket since uni, when she was young and trying out different personalities, wondering if she was a leather jacket sort of girl. She isn’t sure, even now if she’s a leather jacket sort of woman, but she wanted to dress appropriately cool for the concert. Ever since she turned 30, she started to notice that while she’s still young, there were <em>a lot</em> of younger people than she is now, and she didn’t want to look very thirty in a venue that’s bound to be full of twenty-something stoners.</p><p class="p1">She told Michelle and Pat about it, even. About the concert. That Sam had invited her to check out his mate’s band. Neither of them really thought anything of it, from the looks on their faces. Michelle was reacting more on the band itself. She’d apparently watched them before, The September Maggots, and when Robin asked if they were any good, she had said, “Yeah, if you like blatant <em>Deadbeat</em> ripoffs.”</p><p class="p1">She had changed the subject abruptly out of habit, protecting Cormoran’s privacy as she had promised (more to herself) she would.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran also remarked on the jacket. And she had told him. That Sam invited her to go see his mate’s band at The Old Blue Last, and like Michelle, Cormoran hadn’t reacted to the Sam bit of it, reacting more on The Old Blue Last, and how that place was sweltering with even a little crowd gathered, with an air of an almost ‘better you than me’ quality. As though Sam had peddled the invite around and she had been the only taker.</p><p class="p1">Robin took her cue from his reaction. That it didn’t look nor sound like a date so it doesn’t have to be a date unless she wanted it to be. Good enough for her.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">It was a date.</p><p class="p1">From the get-go it had been a date.</p><p class="p1">Because he waited for her on the sidewalk outside the pub. And when they spotted each other they had hugged. And after they hugged, they kissed. And after they parted, they kissed again.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Sam</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Sam Barclay wasn’t blind. The moment he met his new boss on the metalwork staircase of Strike’s office building he thought she was a pretty girl.</p><p class="p1">But that wasn’t anything, thinking someone who looked like her was pretty. She just was.</p><p class="p1">He didn’t think anything of her. Not at the beginning. Mostly because he’s already got a new wife and a new baby and a new house and a new job and a new lifestyle to wrangle. Also he strongly suspected Strike was sweet on her.</p><p class="p1">Now, he didn’t know Strike well. What he liked. But men like that, well, they go for younger girls, don’t they?</p><p class="p1">And she was also married! So. You know. It wasn’t anything like that. He didn’t think it could ever be like that. And he liked her for that, you know? He didn’t have a lot of lady friends himself. He just wasn’t that sort of guy. And from his experience, he’s not the sort of man birds befriend, either. He was the bloke type. The sort you date and then shag, and if it isn’t a good fit, all’s well that ends well, innit?</p><p class="p1">But Rob was different. Funny. Does this thing where she makes a face behind Strike’s back when he gets a bit showy during meetings. Possibly for Sam’s benefit, too. Make him laugh. Not in a flirty way or anything (both married and all) just, friendly-like. Convival work pals.</p><p class="p1">But the work. It bonds you. Just does. They’re like comrades. Not really all that different from waiting around in trenches with fellow squaddies. Cheating bastards. Terror Cells. Not all that different, really. Make sure you’re the one watching, not the other way round.</p><p class="p1">He didn’t think her all that different from, say, Hutchins or Strike himself, really. She’s got aptitude for the job. And when she doesn’t, she’s willing to learn. And Sam observed that unlike people their age, she wasn’t so much figuring out who she was, but readjusting to a new reality. Like him, whose readjustment to civilian life had been a right bitch.</p><p class="p1">So, yeah, they were mates. Colleagues. She was his boss, which he kind of finds hot, you know? Sexy. But, whatever. Everyone’s married. Everyone’s working. Everyone’s got separate slots on the rota, so really. If he had been so inclined, it wasn’t as though he had the <em>time</em>—and not that he was. Looking, or anything. And not that <em>she</em> was—she didn’t seem that sort of girl.</p><p class="p1">Plus, Strike would’ve definitely killed him. And he needed the money. And his head attached to his body. Those two, Rob and Strike. He had thought, when he first worked for them, that there might’ve been something there. They had <em>that</em> sort of energy. Like they were exes or something. It wouldn’t be until later that Sam knew for sure they’d never shagged.</p><p class="p1">And then there was Aileen, who at some point during the whole S.B. Business—right when he was exhausted with work and shook from having to literally talk a man off a ledge—told him that she now likes women!</p><p class="p1">Er, she explained it that she always liked women, but that she thought it was a phase, or that she liked women as well as men, and that she tried desperately to keep that part of her hid because she loved him and all that bollocks.</p><p class="p1">But his Aileen looked so cut up, poor girl. So what’s one to do when the mother of your daughter, the woman you’re faithful to the last couple of years tells you, ‘No longer into pricks now, actually.’? You accept, obviously. And try not to think about how that poor bastard who wanted to jump off Tower Bridge had the right idea.</p><p class="p1">They were still mates, him and Aileen. They still had Maisie. They were still living in the same flat together because, well, he isn’t a private dick for the money.</p><p class="p1">It sucked when she started dating, of course. It sucked even worse when he had to pretend it didn’t suck that she was doing that. It’s not her fault she’s gay and was raised by homophobic arseholes. Not his fault marrying her, either. No-fault divorce if there ever was any.</p><p class="p1">And there was no one else really to tell about all this. No time. He hasn’t got very many friends. Not in London. And this job does you in when your personal life is shit. So him and Rob got to talking. He liked talking to Rob, who would’ve made a damn good shrink if she hadn’t dropped out of uni. Divorce. It can be pretty isolating when you have no one in your corner who understood.</p><p class="p1">She understood.</p><p class="p1">So he might’ve developed a crush. It was allowed. He was single, she was single. And Sam literally dug around for his contract with Strike to double-check if there was anything like that on there. A no-fraternisation clause. Of course Sam knew something like that needed no saying. But he could <em>just</em> argue it, couldn’t he?</p><p class="p1">He thought the point had been moot, when he freaked Robin out when he kissed her on the cheek. He wanted to take it back as soon as he did it, realising with horror that he might’ve just made a move on the boss! But then, things seemed alright after. They were getting on very well, and it was a shot in the dark asking her to the Old Blue Last. But she had said yes!</p><p class="p1">That had been a doozy, when she agreed. And the way she smiled... all dimply-like and bright. At that moment, he was sure—absofuckolutely sure--that he was done for.</p><p class="p1">He’d have been perfectly alright if it wasn’t a date. Part of him thought he needed a friend almost as much as he needed a—well, a <em>shag</em>, if he may be so blunt. It was alright, whatever it was that was going to happen. Friendship, he’ll take it. But if more was on the table, fuck him he’ll take that for sure!</p><p class="p1">Literally took his breath away when they kissed hello. And he was never going to admit this—not under oath, not before a jury—that his first thought had been a panicked, “Oh fuck,” and the image of Strike’s fist colliding with his face.</p><p class="p1">He had some inkling he might be stepping on some toes, here. There was that thing last May when he walked in on them sitting around in the dark having whiskeys. But nothing seemed to have happened. Or if anything did, it might’ve fizzled out. Or… Sam didn’t know. He only knew that you didn’t pass a woman like Robin Ellacott up.</p><p class="p1">So, yeah. Romancing the boss was well worth a Strike Special—the Sarge’s legendary KO punch he’s seen a few times during departmental bouts. Might even be well worth his job, if it came right down to it. He has contacts himself now. Fair game if he started freelancing outside of the agency. Strike knows what he pays.</p><p class="p1">But he was getting ahead of himself. But god Rob is just so brilliant. And it’s just so nice to feel less divorced dad and more lad about town again, it’s hard to think about consequences.</p><p class="p1">They didn’t last very long with The Maggots, who were even more shite than he remembered them. Rocco, the idiot, actually offered them molly. That had been their cue to leave, and he preferred this anyway, sitting on the curb with Rob having late-night falafels across the venue.</p><p class="p1">“Sorry aboot him,” Sam apologised, referring to his mate who literally after saying hello offered them drugs. “He’s a partier.”</p><p class="p1">“It’s okay.” Robin laughed.</p><p class="p1">“A swear a didnae think they were <em>that</em> bad,” he said of the band. “Maybe they’re the sort ye’d like better if ye’re a young person.”</p><p class="p1">She gaped, surprised and indignant, but in an amused sort of way. “Are you saying I’m old?”</p><p class="p1">“Na,” he insisted. “A’m sayin’ <em>A’m</em> old.”</p><p class="p1">“We’re the same age!” she pointed out.</p><p class="p1">Sam shrugged, “Guess A am sayin’ ye’re old.” he dead-panned. Smirking when Robin knocked against his shoulder playfully.</p><p class="p1">So they enjoyed their falafels, basking in how for at least that night, they were just two single people who had gone out and had some fun for a change.</p><p class="p1">He drove her home because of course he did. And by her stoop she told him, “Thanks for tonight, Sam.” with a look and tone so earnest, you’d think he took her to The Ritz. “I really needed this.”</p><p class="p1">He smiled at her and it’s so easy to forget the boss part and so easy to just see her as Robin.</p><p class="p1">“Anytime.”</p><p class="p1">He chanced his luck then, putting his hands on her hips, pulling her closer. She raise her hands and placed them on his chest. And for a second he thought she was going to push him away. But she only pulled herself up to meet him halfway, his face already bending down to capture her mouth in his.</p><p class="p1">He’s not gonna lie, there might’ve been a moan when she opened her mouth to his tongue. It’s been years since he’s felt the exciting novelty of a first kiss. He was even surprised that she tasted minty, which was nice. And he was a little ashamed he might still taste of falafel.</p><p class="p1">“D’you want to come in?” she asked, mouth still so close to his, he felt her breath on his face.</p><p class="p1">“Yeah.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>robin what is you doing????!!</p><p>lololol i made today's chapter of <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29197317/chapters/72502074">Coupling</a> extra romantic because i knew i was gonna post this right after</p><p>anyway I'm so into this ship now i wish more people would get on board lmaooo and writing in Barclay's POV is a goddamn JOY his thought process is a little cluttered its fun to poke around lol</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Michelle</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Michelle Greenstreet saw this from a mile away. She’s been around the block, her. She was a cop for ten years before turning private and working for Strike and Ellacott. She’s seen the different sorts of partners this kind of work produced. If they were cops, those two would be one of The Greats. Partners who worked so well together, so attuned to one another, they always got Great cases, always made Great solves.</p><p class="p1">Everyone hated the Greats. Because if you’re not inside of that elite circle, you probably hate your partner and think you’re carrying a dead weight. Or that you were the dead weight yourself. You had no choice but to envy that sort of partnership, to be on the inside.</p><p class="p1">But of course, when you’re one of the Greats, you’re headed for that Great Burnout. A Great Crash so epic, you end up quitting full stop and finding something else to do with your life.</p><p class="p1">High rewards high risks and all.</p><p class="p1">So yeah, she saw it from a mile away when she slipped a Manila folder under Strike’s flat door that Sunday evening and he opened the door and asked if she wanted to join him in finishing off the whiskey he was already well into.</p><p class="p1">She knew it was more about Robin than it is about her, but what the hell. She liked whiskey and if she was being honest with herself, she also liked Strike.</p><p class="p1">“Did you know about her and Barclay?” he asked after a stretch of flirty banter as they progressively got drunker.</p><p class="p1">See, she saw this from a mile away. Saw how Robin and Barclay were bonding over being divorced. How he would fish in a roundabout way, thinking he was being discreet, about Robin’s love life.</p><p class="p1">“Is that what this is, then?” Michelle chided. “Am I the ‘tit’ for her ‘tat’?”</p><p class="p1">He only sipped his whiskey and Michelle appreciated that he didn’t lie. She doesn’t need to be coddled. She knew from the moment she stepped over the threshold, what she was doing.</p><p class="p1">“I don’t mind,” she said offhandedly. She got a grin. “I had wondered why your contracts didn’t have a no-fraternisation clause.”</p><p class="p1">“Didn’t think I’d need to put it in.” he admitted.</p><p class="p1">“Of course not seeing as you have it bad for Robin.”</p><p class="p1">He didn’t even bat an eye over that. Could be that he’s that drunk, or he’s self-aware this is what everyone rightfully thinks and there’s just no reason to pretend otherwise.</p><p class="p1">“That wasn’t my intention, though.” he did say. “Just never really thought it needed saying.”</p><p class="p1">“Of course it needed saying!” Michelle exclaimed. “People are going to ignore it, sure, but having it in writing will cover your arse. I can’t believe I’m giving you business advice right now.”</p><p class="p1">Strike grinned. “Obviously not much of a head for business, seeing as I have one of my employees in my flat right now.”</p><p class="p1">“I’m freelance, actually.” Michelle clarified. “Now if it were Pat you’ve asked over for a shag—”</p><p class="p1">He choked on his whiskey. Michelle laughed. “You’re grand, Strike. I don’t mind, I told you.”</p><p class="p1">Up until that point, Michelle was fairy certain the night would end in sex. She has her own stuff she’s trying to sort out, her own needs she also wants to uncomplicatedly meet. There are worse ways to spend a Sunday night.</p><p class="p1">“Tell me something,” said Michelle. She was on one end of Strike’s couch, hugging her legs to herself. Him on the oppose end, large arm on the backrest, fingertips tantalisingly brushing against her jean-clad knee. “Is she your first?”</p><p class="p1">Strike gulped a sip of his whiskey. “First what?”</p><p class="p1">“You know,” Michelle urged. “First Great Partner.”</p><p class="p1">He cracked a small smile, looking wistful. “Yeah, I think she is.”</p><p class="p1">Michelle made a face. “Really?” she asked incredulously. “Twenty years doing this and this is the first? What? Fate has only ever handed you duds?”</p><p class="p1">“It’s different with her.”</p><p class="p1">Michelle rolled her eyes. “It’s always different with someone you want to shag.”</p><p class="p1">Strike snorted, amused. Michelle smirked, too.</p><p class="p1">“It’s not like that.” he insisted.</p><p class="p1">“Oh, so you <em>don’t</em> want to shag her?”</p><p class="p1">Strike gave her a look of, <em>what do you think?</em></p><p class="p1">“Go on.” Michelle prodded, lightly kicking at his thigh with her toes. He tutted, catching her wayward foot, pulling at it. She let him, resting her lower leg over his lap now. “What’s it like, then?”</p><p class="p1">He didn’t answer, looking faraway and sipping his drink.</p><p class="p1">“You know what I think?” Michelle continued.</p><p class="p1">“Let’s hear it.”</p><p class="p1">“I think partners should just shag.” she shrugged. Cormoran gave a loud surprised cackle. He hadn’t expected that.</p><p class="p1">“No, seriously.” Michelle continued. She was drunk, but this is also something she believed sober. “Get that bit over with right at the beginning so if it ruins the partnership, so effin’ what, you know? Better to know early if something like a fuck can undo you. It’s the build-up that dicks you in the end. Because by the time the Great Inevitable Shag happens, there’s feelings there now. History. Probably other people. That’s what’s messy, all the rest of it. Not the sex.”</p><p class="p1">“Is that what happened with Eric?” Strike asked, point-blank.</p><p class="p1">“Oh yeah.” Michelle admitted immediately. She usually didn’t. Eric was a sore subject generally, but she doesn’t resent it from Strike who seemed to be on the same boat.</p><p class="p1">“You should’ve seen us, Strike.” she said also wistful. “We had the run of the place, Wardle and I. Greatest friendship of my life.”</p><p class="p1">“Then what happened?”</p><p class="p1">Michelle sighed. “We held out for two years. Two blissful years just working together, just knowing each other, having each other’s backs… you know. Proper partners. We could’ve stayed like that the rest of our careers. But you know how it goes. You get landed a case that’s a bit too intense, a bit too close to home, pushes you a bit closer together.”</p><p class="p1">Michelle was a little lost in her recollection now, feeling nothing but the warmth of the whiskey and Strike’s heavy arm over her ankles.</p><p class="p1">“By the time it happened, it was all wrong.” she said. “We left it too late.” she said, staring at Strike’s face who seemed to only look thoughtful. “We were too close. Too unprepared. Two idiots who didn’t know how to be around each other after. It only goes one of two ways, luv. Either you go all the way or none of the way. All or nothing. No middle ground. None. We weren’t ready for the ‘all’ part. Not then.”</p><p class="p1">“Now you’ve left your job and gone private.” Strike pointed out, as though making a point for himself.</p><p class="p1">“It wasn’t just that that drove me out,” Michelle clarified. “Although that didn’t help. I just knew I would never love the job as much as I did when we were doing it together. I needed to remind myself what about the work I loved, what about it I cared about. Try to do it in a way that’s as different from policework as possible.”</p><p class="p1">When Strike didn’t speak, Michelle asked, “Is that why you and Rob have never—”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah.” he said immediately. “It’ll ruin it.”</p><p class="p1">“Can’t be with her, can’t be without her…” she said, understanding. He gave a sad, thoughtful smile. “What was your plan, then? Make a celibacy pact?”</p><p class="p1">He shrugged. “Do you regret it? Sleeping with Wardle?”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah.” Michelle sighed.</p><p class="p1">“Maybe I should just live with it. Her and Barclay.”</p><p class="p1">“Nah,” Michelle protested. “Eric and I were destined to fuck the same way you and Robin are. That’s why they call it the Great Inevitable Shag. The key is to time it right so it doesn’t ruin your partnership or ruin your life. My money’s on a-s-a-p—”</p><p class="p1">Strike was chuckling at this.</p><p class="p1">“The longer you leave it, messier it gets. How long have you and Robin worked together?”</p><p class="p1">“Five years, thereabouts.”</p><p class="p1">“So, yeah.” Michelle said. “You two are doomed.”</p><p class="p1">“Thanks.” Strike said dryly. “Did you know you’re terrible at cheering people up?”</p><p class="p1">“Is that what I’m meant to be doing?” Michelle asked, feigning surprise. Strike laughed.</p><p class="p1">“What about us.” he said gruffly. “Will screwing each other ruin us?”</p><p class="p1">“Why would it?” said Michelle, pulling one of her ankles from under Strike’s heavy arm, placing her bare foot flat against his thick bicep, pushing at him slightly. “We don’t know each other.” and then she said, “But nothing’s going to happen.”</p><p class="p1">“No?”</p><p class="p1">Michelle cackled as Strike sounded surprised. She could. Do it. Him. She thinks he’s so sexy in that darkly alluring kind of way. If only he wasn’t in love with someone else. If only he didn’t drip with it.</p><p class="p1">“Not my style to be the other woman.”</p><p class="p1">They didn’t have sex. But she did sleep over, too damn drunk the pair of them to conjure up ordering a cab or a bloody Uber for her to get out of there.</p><p class="p1">She didn’t wake up late, at least not for her. Strike was even still asleep on his camp bed in the living room area.</p><p class="p1">Fate is just a bastard, sometimes. Working its mischief when it sees an opening.</p><p class="p1">She didn’t even think to be quiet going down the noisy metalwork stairs. Didn’t think anyone would be up and about the building at 7 in the morning.</p><p class="p1">But someone was already in the office, waiting for Strike to come down. The outer door opened as Michelle clanged the first few steps.</p><p class="p1">She could’ve saved it if she thought quick enough. But she was so surprised, her head throbbing, that she only managed to mirror Robin’s look of shock.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>its my mission to make yall ship ships you didn't even know existed 😈</p><p>if you guys are familiar with tana french or at least have seen dublin murders, michelle is 100% cassie maddox lol i recommend those books they’re the closest thing to strike ive ever read!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Robin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">They didn’t sleep together that first time Robin asked Sam if she wanted to come inside her flat because she completely forgot that Max was hosting one of his artist salons and any hope of the night going further was disrupted by the arty-types asking their opinions about Ibsen and Sam telling them all quite matter-of-factly that the last play he’d seen was a Christmas panto where his Maisie played a tree.</p><p class="p1">So Sam bade her goodnight, platonically with Max right there, and Robin found she was sad to have been interrupted.</p><p class="p1">But they met again the very next day for ice cream with Maisie before father and daughter spent the day together. And she even liked that he didn’t invite her to join them, wanting expressly to spend quality time with his kid, but he asked her out again for the next day and she felt that she wanted to see him back.</p><p class="p1">She liked it, hanging around with Sam, because for some reason it was so easy to forget work with him. It was easy. Light. Fun. Like she could be a different sort of Robin for a little bit. The free as a bird kind. The sort that could enjoy dates and not have to worry about the big things. Or consequences. Or consequences of consequences.</p><p class="p1">That Sunday they pretended they were tourists. Heading for the Tower of London on a silly whim. They regretted it immediately, because there was nothing but queues.</p><p class="p1">But they laughed a lot, and kissed plenty, and took idiotic pictures and for the first time in five years she felt brand new.</p><p class="p1">Max was gone all day, but Robin might not have cared even if he was there, so intent was she now for the next part. This part: her pushing Sam back over her bed, straddling his hips, enjoying the firm way he gripped her thighs under her sundress.</p><p class="p1">She kissed him fiercely, thinking only of sex, of how it grew stale before she had any opportunity to enjoy it.</p><p class="p1">She intended to enjoy it this time.</p><p class="p1">And she did. Enjoy it. How they wanted each other so badly, she’d sunk down him before bothering with pulling off her dress. How he had sat up with her, his toned legs draped over the side of her bed as they met each other thrust for thrust. How she was driven to loud pleasure that startled Wolfgang so that the dog started barking outside her bedroom door.</p><p class="p1">She felt immediately shy afterwards, her face in her hands, still straddled on Sam’s lap, her bare skin aflame and glistening with sweat.</p><p class="p1">“Sweet girl,” he cooed, panting, catching his breath. She could feel his hands cupping her neck, his thumb grazing her clavicle, all of her tingling with electricity. “Oh, ma sweet girl.”</p><p class="p1">He whispered beautiful things, cradling her in his arms as she burrowed her face against his chest, calming from the intensity she was not at all expecting. “Ye’re brilliant,” he tells her, kissing her bare shoulder. “Beautiful.”</p><p class="p1">Experiencing it again now, she realised just how long it had been since she felt cherished.</p><p class="p1">She put her arms around Sam, (Sam. Sam. Sam.) allowing him to tell her grand things, to make her feel this way, to surprise her so thoroughly with his care and sweetness that she never in a million years thought she’d have with Sam! Of all people!</p><p class="p1">But he was here. With her. And she put his face in her hands to drink in his face, sighing open-mouthed with wonderment.</p><p class="p1">She never thought she could share something like this with someone other than Matthew. Other than Cor—</p><p class="p1">She took a sudden sharp breath as if coming up for air, wrenching her wandering mind away from dangerous, far-off thoughts.</p><p class="p1">Sam. Sam. Sam. Sam. Sam.</p><p class="p1">She felt him kiss her cheek and made the first shifts to disentangle from him.</p><p class="p1">“Shower,” she said, her voice hoarse and felt again shy to realise why that was so.</p><p class="p1">“Can I join ye?” he asked, his smile a mix of sheepish and sweet and expectant.</p><p class="p1">She shook her head though smiling, knowing that would definitely be far too far.</p><p class="p1">“Okay.” he said, soft kiss on her top lip before letting her finally disembark.</p><p class="p1">Afterwards, they laid side by side on Robin’s bed, letting the bright afternoon waste away to night, Robin’s mind whirring, worry and anxiety over what they had just done—what they were doing—taking up space now in her thoughts.</p><p class="p1">“How do people do this, Sam?” she wondered, turning her head up from against his chest. He was staring at the ceiling, one arm behind his head, the other pressing her to him.</p><p class="p1">“Do what?”</p><p class="p1">“Date?”</p><p class="p1">He gave a small smirk.</p><p class="p1">“Dinnae,” he says, tips of his fingers rubbing up and down her spine. “Ye seem’t pretty well-vers’t just then—”</p><p class="p1">“Tch!” she said, rolling her eyes. She had asked a pretty serious question. But she wasn’t really annoyed, laying back down against him, liking the warmth of his chest against her cheek. Two years is too long a time not to have this in her life.</p><p class="p1">She liked how she could feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed, thinking she’d miss it tonight when he leaves.</p><p class="p1">“I dinnae either, Rob,” Sam sighed before long. “To be honest, it’s been awhile fer me, too, since—”</p><p class="p1">And Robin understood, because that’s exactly what she felt herself. When you’ve been with someone for a very long time, or for very seriously—serious enough for marriage and family—it’s hard to see romance as light, or casual, or fleeting.</p><p class="p1">Even now, even as she laid unsure where she and Sam were going with this, she couldn’t help herself from picturing some type of life with him. Not that she was in love with him or anything, but she could still see it. How well Sam would sit next to her at family dinners. How he’d fit right in with her brothers. How her parents would like him certainly on the onset, a single dad with a cracking sense of humor and exuded this general energy of being a good person.</p><p class="p1">She could picture it so clearly, how they’d look hanging out at pubs with mates. Lazy weekend afternoons with his head on her lap as they watched telly. Taking Maisie on little outings like they were a small family unit. The way they would both thoroughly understand the demands of their work.</p><p class="p1">“But a think,” Sam continued, and Robin pulled up to look at his face, and he looked down at her and smiled. “They take it one day at a time.”</p><p class="p1">She smiled back at him. <em>One day at a time</em>, she thought. She liked that.</p><p class="p1">“Do you fancy me today, Rob?” he asked.</p><p class="p1">Her smile grew even larger, feeling like laughing, thinking it was quite the understatement when their limbs were entwined and there isn’t a stitch on her. “Yes, I fancy you today.” she replied anyway and then asked him back, “What about you? Do you fancy me today?”</p><p class="p1">The look on his face gave her pause. Not because she could read that he didn’t, but because he was giving her a look that she last saw on someone else’s face that one other time. Nighttime. Staircase. White dress.</p><p class="p1">Sam only nodded, leaning forward to kiss her again. “Yes.”</p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1">* * *</p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1">The Tottenham was empty that morning, the barkeep too astute to come in and ask if they were ordering. They were only sitting in front of each other, in the booth that saw many a conversation between the two partners. They were both looking outside the large window, into busy Tottenham Court Road where Robin envied the passersby because wherever they were going, she doubted they were headed similarly where she suspected she might be.</p><p class="p1">A parting of the ways.</p><p class="p1">"Did you and Michelle--?" she asked anyway, knowing full well if she had every right, she doesn't anymore. Not really.</p><p class="p1">She wiped an errant tear from her cheek, borne from finding Michelle walking down from Cormoran's flat that morning. First there had been surprise, and then pain, and now disappointment and fear that she and Cormoran were at a point of no return.</p><p class="p1">"No," he says. The first word he's spoken to her that morning. </p><p class="p1">She turned to Cormoran suddenly. Surprised. She didn't for a second think he was lying. She knew he was telling the truth.</p><p class="p1">"But you and Sam?"</p><p class="p1">She was startled by the buzzing of her phone in her hand. Before she swiftly clicked to set it to silent, she had seen the text that came in: <strong>Do you fancy me today? XX</strong></p><p class="p1">Her eyes flew back to Cormoran's face that only looked tired and unreadable besides that. He had told her the truth and she knew it had cost him. And knowing that what she'll do next will cost her, too, she did it anyway. She nodded.</p><p class="p1">"Yeah."</p><p class="p1">Swiftly, he walked out. And as Robin felt the first painful prickle of hot tears welling in her eyes, she texted Sam back: <strong>Yes.</strong></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Cormoran</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>dedicated to RaeNonnyNonny who wanted more</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">They never spoke of it again.</p><p class="p1">That little exchange in the Tottenham—when he told her nothing happened between him and Michelle and she told him about her and Barclay—was all they said about the matter.</p><p class="p1">He was determined to be professional. And fair. And comport himself in such a way befitting the owner of a reputable detective agency.</p><p class="p1">He asked Ilsa to draft one of those things, those disclosure things, leaving it on Robin’s side of the partner’s desk one night and coming back to it the next morning signed by both of them with a corresponding folder ready for him to file.</p><p class="p1">So he did.</p><p class="p1">And that was that.</p><p class="p1">He was unhappy, of course. A sort of unhappy that made him feel like he was carrying a lead weight around his shoulders. A sort of unhappy that made every single person he saw that week tell him, “You look like shit!” and he growls away their concern and surprise by getting down to business.</p><p class="p1">He marvelled at how little his and Robin’s daily interactions changed and yet how seismic the difference was now. Before, there had been Something. Something he could cling onto when she would smile at him unprompted when they catch each other’s eye in the middle of work, or when she would giggle so satisfyingly when he cracked a cheeky comment as they made tea by the sink.</p><p class="p1">When before, with Matthew, he asked himself, <em>why that twat?, </em>now in his moments of low, he found himself asking out into the night: <em>why not me?</em></p><p class="p1">Why not him? Haven’t they been building something together? Not just their business but a relationship that he once thought could lay the groundwork towards something more? And all of a sudden, out of nowhere—</p><p class="p1">How did that bloody happen? Has it been happening this entire time? Somehow, Cormoran didn’t think so. He knew Robin a0d knew that she couldn’t do to another woman what her ex-husband had done to her.</p><p class="p1">He’d been braced for Morris. If she somehow entertained his smarmy overtures, he was braced for it. But Barclay? If Cormoran was honest with himself, it’s Barclay that makes this so unbearable. Because for all of Robin’s determined matter-of-factness and compartmentalising, Barclay looked exactly the man who’s met a great woman and knows exactly how lucky he is.</p><p class="p1">They’ve never so much as looked at each other when they’re around Cormoran, but Barclay was just so goddamn happy he envied him as much as any man could envy another. Cormoran’s mind flew to other possibilities. Wishful thinking. If maybe Barclay was a prick, took her for granted, he could maybe whisk her away…</p><p class="p1">But he knew Sam was a good person. Of course, in Cormoran’s pissed-off mind, he doesn’t think him so upstanding, swooping in like that. But he knew he had no right to Robin. Not like that. But he also knew that Sam had no idea what he had taken from him.</p><p class="p1">He saw from the corner of his eye Sam heading for the Tottenham. He saw the spring in his step, the the easy lightness in his expression, like he was experiencing happy days and well knew it. And he felt like a pint, even though he was already well into his second.</p><p class="p1">He watched as Sam stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to take a phonecall. Saw how quickly his face fell and he felt something in the pit of his stomach drop, trying to recall where Robin might be this afternoon. But then Sam winced and Cormoran pulled out his own phone. It was Andy. Cancelling. Tied up on the Mesner job.</p><p class="p1">“Hey,” Sam started, sitting in front of him in the booth. “Andy’s—”</p><p class="p1">“On Mesner, yeah.” said Cormoran.</p><p class="p1">Silence.</p><p class="p1">“Mitch an I aboot done wi’ the Teddy case--” Sam started again. “B’ next week, we reckon.”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran nodded. “Biscuits needs someone to get an in with his warehouse guys—” said Cormoran.</p><p class="p1">“Na problem.” Sam was saying.</p><p class="p1">“Stripes will need another two weeks surveillance—”</p><p class="p1">“Na problem.” said Sam again.</p><p class="p1">“Two Times—”</p><p class="p1">“On it.”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran raised his eyebrows at that. He was going to take that off his plate. Didn’t want to think it, but he thought it anyway: surely someone with a new girlfriend would prefer his nights free.</p><p class="p1">Sam sighed and for the first time that week he didn’t look like he’d won the lottery. “Need the money, mate.”</p><p class="p1">He wanted to retort, ‘For dates’, but it thankfully caught in his throat.</p><p class="p1">Sam seemed to read his mind because he recovered quickly. “Wi’ the divorce an’ all. An’ Maisie needs new everything a’ the time—”</p><p class="p1">“Right.”</p><p class="p1">“Anythin’ ye need, just tell me. A’m yer man—” said Sam, looking earnest and eager to work. Cormoran wondered what about it was his cashflow problem and what about it was reparation.</p><p class="p1">He ought to say he’ll talk to Robin about it because that’s what they did if they increased or decreased subcontractor hours, but he didn’t feel like saying her name so he said, “I’ll think it over.”</p><p class="p1">Silence.</p><p class="p1">And then Sam spoke first. “Listen, mate—”</p><p class="p1"><em>Shit. Fuck. Shit. Fuck. Shit</em>.</p><p class="p1">“A’m not gonna hurt her—” he said, as though he implied that Sam was planning to. “A know she’s yer best mate—”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran held up a hand at that, and the words died in Sam’s mouth. That one stung. Properly stung. Because Sam was talking to him as though he was one of Robin’s brothers. And in his mouth, best mate did not feel the way it did that Spring night when it meant all the world for them to say it to each other.</p><p class="p1">The only way he would know is that if Robin told him. In a way that might be prefixed with ‘only’ or ‘just’. Only business partners. Just best mates.</p><p class="p1">“As senior partner, I don’t need more liabilities, Barclay.” he said as matter of fact as he could. The way Sam nodded in swift agreement, he accepted this was the only reason. “Anything else on your end?”</p><p class="p1">Sam shook his head.</p><p class="p1">“Right.” said Strike. “Sure there’s somewhere else you’d rather be.”</p><p class="p1">The way Sam grinned, you’d think Strike gave them his blessing. But he left. Pat him on the back as he went. And Strike had no doubts he was off to Earl’s Court.</p><p class="p1">He pulled his pint closer to him, blinking down into the half empty glass, wishing it had the ability to drown him.</p><p class="p1">He was going to take an orange-skinned peroxide blonde home with him, but she followed him to the men’s room and knelt and even at that state he was not the sort for a casual shag at the loo of his bloody local, not even that drunk, so he left feeling so lonely, he could step into traffic.</p><p class="p1">He laid on his bed, blinking at his screen, looking for someone he could ring. He was glad that he was not yet lonely enough to call Charlotte, but was a little bemused that he was down enough to ring Lucy.</p><p class="p1">“What’s happened?” said Lucy.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran chuckled, amused that his sister immediately assumed someone’s been maimed. “Nothing, just wanted to say hi.”</p><p class="p1">The pause on the other line told him plainly that Ilsa has told his sister what’s been happening. But then Lucy only asked about how quitting is going, and whether or not his leg is bothering him lately, and when he’s going to come around for dinner, before prattling on about some drama with Adam’s schoolteacher, and how Luke is getting into boxing, and how unhappy Greg is that Jack’s bedroom is camo-themed, and her sneaking suspicion that Ted’s getting too fond of the new lady vicar.</p><p class="p1">He felt very fond of Lucy just then, showing some restraint and mercy not needling him about Robin. Giving him what he needed at that moment: a reminder that he isn’t at all alone in the world.</p><p class="p1">“You know,” said Lucy. “Adam’s teacher is quite lovely.”</p><p class="p1">“Weren’t you just calling her a stern shrew?”</p><p class="p1">Lucy laughed. “Okay, maybe Adam is acting a bit of a brat.”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran didn’t take the opening.</p><p class="p1">“If you come to Adam’s football game this weekend, you can meet her. I think you’ll like her. I’ll send you a pic.”</p><p class="p1">“Christ, Luce.” he chuckled, getting her hint: there are other fishes in the pond, some of them perfectly nice schoolteachers who might lure you into marriage and family. “I’ll try.”</p><p class="p1">That seemed good enough for Lucy, and they parted on surprisingly good terms.</p><p class="p1">The good feeling he got from that conversation didn’t last very long, because he ended up out of bed anyway.</p><p class="p1">Outdoors.</p><p class="p1">Near midnight.</p><p class="p1">Robin’s front door.</p><p class="p1">Sober as anything.</p><p class="p1">He knocked.</p><p class="p1">“Cormoran?” she answered, surprised. Closing the front door behind her. “Is everything okay?”</p><p class="p1">He looked at her then. Her hair was in a messy pony tail, wearing no make-up. Clad in a ratty old t-shirt and gingham green pajama bottoms. And his bruised peach of a heart turned to pulp, wishing he was coming home to her.</p><p class="p1">Taking a deep breath, he said it on exhale.</p><p class="p1">“I’m in love with you.”</p><p class="p1">He saw her sharp intake of breath. The widening of her eyes in shock. Her mouth falling open and agape. For perhaps an eternity, they only looked at each other.</p><p class="p1">She sounded breathless too, when she spoke.</p><p class="p1">“That’s not fair.”</p><p class="p1">He nodded, his eyes straight into hers. Pools of blue gray waters he wanted to drown in.</p><p class="p1">“I know.”</p><p class="p1">And with that, he turned to walk away.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>im obsessed with this fic lol</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Sam</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>whaaat?? a quick update?? *le gasp*</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Sam woke when Robin extricated herself from his embrace, and then he heard it, too.</p><p class="p1">Knocking on the door.</p><p class="p1">“A’ll get it—” he kicked off the duvet and got off the bed.</p><p class="p1">“No, it’s okay.” Robin whispered, already heading out her bedroom.</p><p class="p1">He still went of course, middle of the effin’ night, can’t be good news, can it?</p><p class="p1">It was Strike, and immediately Sam twigged that can be good. So he leaned against the console table on the hallway and crossed his arms and thought he’ll give Strike two minutes before he headed out himself.</p><p class="p1">Robin was back inside in ten seconds.</p><p class="p1">He wanted to ask, ‘what did he want’, but he knew he should ask, “Everything okay, yeah?”</p><p class="p1">He was already outstretching his hand to pull her into him, and a quick kiss on her temple and they’re back in her bedroom. She looked faraway.</p><p class="p1">Where does Strike get off, messing her about in the middle of the night?</p><p class="p1">“Just needed to tell me something,” said Robin, back under the sheets, on autopilot.</p><p class="p1">Sam had an inkling what it must be. Quick like a drive-by, the look on her face. What else could he have said in ten seconds to give Rob that look on her face. But Sam didn’t ask. He wanted to, but he knew if it was something he needed to know, she would’ve said it.</p><p class="p1">Instead, well, he was already up and she was also up, and maybe…</p><p class="p1">They kissed, his hands immediately dipping in her pajama bottoms. Just splayed against bare skin a minute as their kissing deepened. And a fraction of movement further down and she was telling him, “I don’t really feel like it.”</p><p class="p1">“Na problem.” he pulled his wandering hand away and kissed her nose. It was a problem, though. Not because she said no, but he was effin’ sure Strike made some kind of effin’ move just there right under his bloody nose.</p><p class="p1">But Robin settled further against his body, even pulled at his arm to hold her, and he figured whatever just happened can wait until morning.</p><p class="p1">When Sam woke up, it was barely light out, but Robin was already awake, staring at the ceiling.</p><p class="p1">“Did ye sleep at all?” he asked, gently moving hair off her face. Her eyes met his and Sam thought she looked worried. But she smiled all dimply and it took his damn breath away. “Very well.”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah?”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah.” then she kissed him. And all the kissing very soon turned into more than just kissing, and all their clothes were kicked off and lost under the sheets.</p><p class="p1">“Heavy?” he asked her, still on top of her, their bodies closely pressed together, Sam’s elbows on either side of her to take some of his weight. He could feel her fingers up and down his spine, making him jerk into her every time her wicked fingers got near his arse crack.</p><p class="p1">She giggled at that.</p><p class="p1">“Ye naughty—!” he growled, burrowing his face against her neck and sucking.</p><p class="p1">“Oh! Don’t leave a mark!” she said urgently, and he didn’t because he’s also old and it’s been decades since he left anyone hickies on their neck.</p><p class="p1">“C’mon, wad I?” he said.</p><p class="p1">They were playful that morning. Happy. Sexy. Hot and heavy under the sheets, him trying to shush her a little because she could get a wee bit loud and he knew she’d hate if Max got a good listen.</p><p class="p1">They were sat on her bed, still naked, Robin hugging her knees to her, Sam kissing the bare skin of her back. She was lost in thought again, faraway.</p><p class="p1">In hindsight, the question that came to him firstly sounded wrong, and secondly, might be the worst to ask when you’ve got your hands rubbing up and down a woman’s bare back, but Sam isn’t really one of the world’s greatest thinkers.</p><p class="p1">“Dae ye want to see other people?”</p><p class="p1">“What?” she asked, shocked, immediately creating such a space between them, he knew he’d fucked up.</p><p class="p1">Then he heard it. How it sounded. “I mean, if ye want tae see other people…”</p><p class="p1">She was only glaring at him.</p><p class="p1">“A-a dinnae want te…” he was stammering now, but her shocked glare softened at that. “But if yae want to—Strike an...”</p><p class="p1">What he really wanted to say is that if she was thinking of Strike, he didn’t want to be down for the count. That he’ll go up the great Sarge in any ring to fight for her if that’s what it takes.</p><p class="p1">“Do you want to see other people?” she asked him and it does sound ridiculous, he gave a cackle.</p><p class="p1">“Fuck na!”</p><p class="p1">That made her happy, scooting back next to him. She kissed his bicep, then he put his arms around her.</p><p class="p1">“That’s whit he came ‘round here last night for?” Sam asked. Had to.</p><p class="p1">“I don’t…” she started. “I don’t know what he wants, really.”</p><p class="p1">“Whit dae ye want?”</p><p class="p1">She didn’t answer that one. That did not escape his notice. She only burrowed herself against her chest and said, instead, “Fancy me today?”</p><p class="p1">God help him, that made him grin wide.</p><p class="p1">“Yea, fancy ye today!” he said. “Silly goose, give us a kiss.”</p><p class="p1">He doesn’t right know how she feels for Strike, but he figured if he’s the one on her bed, the one allowed to hold her like—then he was chosen, you know? She was given options and picked him.</p><p class="p1">Good enough.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Rob was the only good thing going for him it seems like. Rob and Maisie. Aileen complaining all the time about money. They were both working now, but with child minder fees and legal fees, there was more money but more expenses, so they might be worse off than they were before they split up.</p><p class="p1">Before Rob he would’ve wanted to get back together. He will always love Aileen, mother of his child. Just most convenient to be together at this point. They can call off the lawyers and neither of them would feel pressure to save up to move out. No longer an option, though. His Aileen had transformed in the last few months. Happier, too. And he’s happy for her, truly he is. Aileen’s happy, Maisie’s happy, he’s happy. They’re poor, sure, but there are worse things to be.</p><p class="p1">“D’you think Rob wad like that?” he pointed at a dainty dragonfly necklace on display as he and Andy walked down the street following Stripes on foot that afternoon.</p><p class="p1">“Thought you needed the money?”</p><p class="p1">Sam shrugged. “How much coud it be, eh?”</p><p class="p1">They went inside the jewellery store because Stripes went inside the jewellery store. Perfect cover. Andy eavesdropped on what Stripes was doing (picking out some necklace that would end up around the neck of a mistress) and Sam looked forlornly at jewellery he can’t afford.</p><p class="p1">They left Stripes alone after that, figuring they have enough to be getting on with. “How long has it been, then? A month?”</p><p class="p1">Sam grinned. “Three, now, actually. Where’s yer head at, old man?”</p><p class="p1">“On the job, unlike you.”</p><p class="p1">Sam made a face. “I work! Been working’ flat oot these last three months. Barely see her as it is. Barely see ma kid!”</p><p class="p1">Andy shook his head, sipping his pint. “Never would’ve thought it. You and Rob.”</p><p class="p1">“Wh’t? A’m handsome!”</p><p class="p1">“I just don’t shit where I eat, that’s all. Ain’t right.”</p><p class="p1">Sam took offence to this turn of phrase, thinking what he and Rob have is actually very much not ‘shitting where you eat,’ but didn’t say it. Said instead, “Love her tae bits, Andy.”</p><p class="p1">“Hm,” Andy replied as though it was a matter for him to consider.</p><p class="p1">“Meetin’ her parents this weekend, even!” he said as though to defend his relationship to him.</p><p class="p1">Andy didn’t react. Might not even care, really. He’s not a man of very many words. But he was looking outside the large window as though something behind Sam caught his attention. He craned his neck to see a tiny red Mini. They could see Strike in the passenger’s seat. See him lean over to give the driver a goodbye kiss before extracting from the tiny vehicle like a large out of an impossibly small car.</p><p class="p1">Excitedly, he turned back to Andy. “Did ye know Strike’s seein’ someone?”</p><p class="p1">Andy only shrugged. But this cheered Sam up so much, he wanted to laugh. About bloody time Strike moved on.</p><p class="p1">When they met at her place for dinner, the only gift he could offer was a bracelet—made of plastic from one of Maisie’s arts and crafts kits. His daughter even made a chunky necklace that ‘match’ (it does not match).</p><p class="p1">She sat on his lap and rested against his chest and said, “Thank you.” and then, “I love you.” and then, “Why are you crying?”</p><p class="p1">“Jesus, sorry!” he sniffled, embarrassed. Not in a million years did he think she’d say it first.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>pls ship them a little bit im trying SO! HARD! lol</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Kerenza</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">Kerenza Rowe lived in Cornwall for all her life, until she turned 40 and decided on a change. A big one, exchanging her quaint little seaside cottage for a modest flat in London. Never having experienced living in a big city for longer than the odd fortnight here and there, she never fully appreciated just how fast life could go until it started happening to her.</p><p class="p1">She looked at herself in the mirror, inspecting if her flowy midi dress accentuated parts of her she didn’t want accentuated. She can’t seem to be sure.</p><p class="p1">“What do you think?”</p><p class="p1">“Beautiful.” Cormoran smiled dutifully, even looking at her when she asked.</p><p class="p1">“You don’t think it makes me look too much of a frumpy old lady?”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran heaved off her armchair, hands on her hips, pulling her to him. She put her arms around him. “If you’re a frumpy old lady, what would that make me?” he challenged, giving her a gentle kiss. It still makes her heart flutter, six months in, how she managed to find a man who makes her feel like a giddy young thing having experiencing her first, true flirtation.</p><p class="p1">He isn’t a very amorous man, her Cormoran, not in company. As though he’s had her compartmentalised like everything else in his life. But she doesn’t mind, because it’s thrilling to know she’s the only person who sees this side of the Great City Detective. All they get is one side of him, she gets all the rest of it.</p><p class="p1">He kisses her again. A hungrier sort. Grip on her hips a little tighter. She pulls away, but he only moves to her neck. “We’re going to be late,” she points out.</p><p class="p1">“S’okay,” he groans against her skin. “M’always late.”</p><p class="p1">She giggles, though she doubts it. It’s rare for him to be late with her for anything.</p><p class="p1">She pulls away anyway. “I want her to like me.”</p><p class="p1">He knots his eyebrows. “Who?” and then it dawns on him, “Robin? Pretty sure she likes you better than she likes me.”</p><p class="p1">That’s not true. “That’s not true,” she says. Robin loves him. “She loves you.”</p><p class="p1">They both froze. Something slipped out that ought to not have slipped out. She meant that she could see that they have great fondness for each other as friends and business partners. But she seemed to have pressed a wrong button.</p><p class="p1">She knew all about it, of course. The women in Cormoran’s life can’t seem to help but talk about him even with the littlest prodding. Joan, who had once told her, <em>“If Corm isn’t so besotted with that Robin of his, you’d be right his type.” </em>Lucy, who seemed to have fretted over her dying aunt and her big brother’s bachelorhood in equal measure. <em>“Why those two just wouldn’t shag, or date, or kiss, I honestly don’t know!”</em> and Ilsa, who seemed unhappy by it, <em>“I just don’t think it’s okay, what she did. Would you date anyone under your employ, Kerry?”</em></p><p class="p1">She got it from him, too, of course. Their very first night together. After he and his mates helped her move six months ago, he stayed when everyone else had gone.</p><p class="p1">
  <em>“You know it’s written all over your face, right?”</em>
</p><p class="p1">
  <em>“What?” he asked, one hand trailing up and down her naked body pressed against him.</em>
</p><p class="p1">
  <em>“That you’re heartbroken?”</em>
</p><p class="p1">
  <em>“Is that a problem?” he asked, point blank.</em>
</p><p class="p1">
  <em>She shrugged. “Not tonight,” and kissed him.</em>
</p><p class="p1">That they made it to six months, that theirs feel like a proper relationship—not a fling, not a casual arrangement—had been a surprise to them both.</p><p class="p1">She’s met Robin frequently over the last six months, but not yet apart from Cormoran. And regardless of a past with Cormoran, she seemed to be part of his life for the long haul. As was she. And she wanted to get to know Robin better, and for the younger woman to genuinely like her. Not for Cormoran, not <em>as</em> his girlfriend, but for herself.</p><p class="p1">Plus she’s also a little intimidating, so young and already the other half of a celebrated detective agency in London. Mates with famous, handsome, and trendy telly actors like Max Priestwood who seemed to have blocked off his busy schedule to help her move.</p><p class="p1">“Is this the famous Kerenza, then?” Max Priestwood beamed at her when they arrived, giving both her and Cormoran kisses on the cheek. Unlike Cormoran, who took it in stride, she felt herself blushing.</p><p class="p1">The scene was already chaotic, full of boxes and people calling out, “Excuse me!” and “On yer left, luv!” before she realised she was blocking the doorway.</p><p class="p1">She pressed herself against the wall, a literal wallflower, wondering how she can help.</p><p class="p1">“Kerry!” exclaimed Robin’s friendly voice, and she saw her squeeze past Cormoran and her partner, Sam, to run over to her and give her a hug.</p><p class="p1">Robin was not hard to love at all, Kerenza, mused. So warm and lovely. “Robin, hi! How can I help? Put me to use.” she said eagerly.</p><p class="p1">Robin laughed, “I might have more help than I have stuff to move. Come meet my brothers,” she took her hand and pulled her towards the kitchen and dining where she found Cormoran and three other handsome guys were around a small dining table, having a chat.</p><p class="p1">“Can I get you a beer, Kerry?” Robin’s brother, Martin asked, already holding the refrigerator open, waiting for her order. “Oh, just orange juice if there’s any.” she requested, taking a seat next to Cormoran. Both of them had been too late to help with any of the major moving. From under the table, he held her hand.</p><p class="p1">One of Robin and Cormoran’s Met friends, Vanessa, was also there. She was in a small group in the modest backyard with Max Priestwood, and one of the agency detectives, Michelle Greenstreet. The three of them huddled together like that, attractive and haughty-looking, Kerenza thought they don’t make ‘em like that in Cornwall.</p><p class="p1">When Andy, too, arrived, Cormoran left her in the dining room before popping back in again and grinning at her said, “Guess who just arrived.”</p><p class="p1">She sprung up to hug Nick, who second to Cormoran, might be her favorite person in London so far. Apart from him getting her a job at his hospital, he and Ilsa have become close friends of hers, too. “Where’s Ils?”</p><p class="p1">Nick stiffened in her hug. Cormoran, from behind Nick, gave her a look. Oh yeah. Ilsa and Robin. Not good. Right. Pregnancy brain really messing with her otherwise good memory today.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p3">* * * * *</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Robin found Cormoran sat alone outside her little garden, taking a breather on the patio furniture he had helped move in. She sat next to him, handing him a beer.</p><p class="p1">“Ta,” he said. “Great place, Robin.”</p><p class="p1">“Thanks. Bit of a commute, but I like it.”</p><p class="p1">With an air of biting the bullet, Cormoran asked, “Sam moving in, too?”</p><p class="p1">She took a deep breath and then said, “I asked.”</p><p class="p1">“And?”</p><p class="p1">And because they’re best mates, she told him, “Says he can’t afford to half with the rent.”</p><p class="p1">“We can help him with that.” Cormoran offered immediately. “He’s due for a raise.”</p><p class="p1">They recently gave him one because he’s working harder than perhaps all of them combined at the moment, so Robin took it as a friend helping out another friend.</p><p class="p1">“I dunno,” she sighed. Robin knew money was something Sam was worrying about constantly now and eight months in, they were not yet at that stage where Sam would let Robin share some of his financial strain. “Don’t really want to talk about it right now.”</p><p class="p1">“Fair enough.”</p><p class="p1">It was Robin’s turn to ask a hard and uncomfortable question. One that still feels like a knot in her stomach. “How far along is she?”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran gave her the exact deep sigh. “Three months.”</p><p class="p1">“And how are you feeling about it?”</p><p class="p1">“Oh, you know,” he said. “Better every day, I think. Getting used to the idea.”</p><p class="p1">“You know you—”</p><p class="p1">“Please don’t say I’ll make a good father.” he interrupted, almost pleadingly.</p><p class="p1">Robin laughed. “I was going to say you look bloody terrified!”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran smiled sheepisly, too. “Oh. Yeah, I am.”</p><p class="p1">Silence. And then Cormoran continued. “Can’t believe how this year’s going, can you?”</p><p class="p1">Robin laughed at that, too. “No! Gosh. It’s almost autumn, too. Where’s the year gone?”</p><p class="p1">They sat with that thought a while. October around the corner. This time last year, they were on the precipice of something. More. Else. Together.</p><p class="p1">“I’m sorry.” said Robin. “About eight months ago—”</p><p class="p1">“No, that wasn’t your fault.” he insisted. “I shouldn’t have—”</p><p class="p1">“I don’t mean that night. I meant...” she wasn’t looking at him. “It was me, too.”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran knotted his eyebrows, not sure what Robin meant.</p><p class="p1">“I also waited too long.”</p><p class="p1">And then it dawned on him. “Oh, Robin. You can’t—” he said, perplexed and terrified she was saying this all these months later, after everything that’s happened. And he felt what Robin must’ve felt that night when he came to her door, no business telling her things that were far too late.</p><p class="p1">“I don’t mean—” she started. They both seem to be stammering now, unable to finish sentences. “I just… I just wanted to say sorry.”</p><p class="p1">That’s when their eyes met. They held each other’s gaze, thinking mutually about their now diverging personal lives and how it once was so close to colliding. If things were different, if either of them had been brave enough to have made the first move, Cormoran wondered if it might be him moving into this flat instead of Sam. Robin, too, wondered if things were different, might she be the one having his baby?</p><p class="p1">The way they looked at each other, mirroring sadness and pain. Not because they still loved the other in that way, but perhaps because they no longer do. Because they see it as plainly as they understood that they were business partners, and best mates, and kindred spirits, and soulmates—that they are too, to each other, the one who got away.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Cormoran</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">He thought he was going to be sick, shocked when the test came back positive. Like a frazzled teen, he recalled what he had done wrong to get himself in this mess. He was clean, and Kerenza was on birth control, and she had said on a previous conversation that doctors had told her conceiving might not be in her cards. They were both forty, now, so really the chances of it…</p><p class="p1">And then he looked at her. The look on her face, stunned in quite the opposite way he was. And through his shock and dismay, it registered to him that he was witnessing her realising she had been handed a miracle. And as certain as he was of all the facts of his life, it dawned on him that this baby—his baby—was real.</p><p class="p1">He was going to be a father.</p><p class="p1">He was only glad she seemed too stunned and overjoyed to register the terror and regret he felt that first night.</p><p class="p1">He took her to Cornwall that weekend because she had the strong desire to be with family and thought it was a great idea because he craved for nothing more at that moment than Ted’s advice.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran found him at the church tending the gardens, but unlike the drowned flowerbeds he was over-tending, his friendship with the lady vicar seemed to be blossoming.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran would’ve teased Ted about it, but this situation has sapped the good humor left in him. When Cormoran finished telling his uncle about his predicament, Ted said, “Have I ever told you about Wenna Penberthy?”</p><p class="p1">“Wenna Hammet, you mean?” Cormoran clarified. She was Ilsa’s mum.</p><p class="p1">“She was Penberthy, by birth. Would’ve been Wenna Nancarrow if I had things my way.”</p><p class="p1">This shocking bombshell wiped his mind clean off all his other concerns. “What.”</p><p class="p1">“Oh, yeah.” Ted said good-naturedly, giving the drowning plants another shower with the hose that Cormoran tugged it from his uncle’s grip to save plant lives. “Loved that girl to bits, in my youth. But her parents didn’t like me, of course. We were the Nancarrows at the end of the lane then. The family you whispered on about. Kids always left alone, parents never around. No better than an overflown skip in their eyes.</p><p class="p1">“We were always trying to run away, Wenna and I. Trying to run off to London or someplace we could be together. We never did get very far. And one day, her old da, gave me a hundred quid and told me if I come back in a month and made something of that hundred quid, he would let Wenna marry me.”</p><p class="p1">This was news to Cormoran, and he wondered if Joan knew this at all. He remembered his childhood where Joan and Wenna were thick as thieves for a time, and then suddenly they weren’t. He thought they simply lost what it was they had in common, but now he thought, it might be for this reason.</p><p class="p1">“Then what happened?”</p><p class="p1">“Came back a month later having turned that hundred quid into a thousand quid. But Old Man Penberthy took that time to marry her off to someone else.”</p><p class="p1">“Shit.”</p><p class="p1">Ted snorted. “It was, alright. Broke my heart clean in two when I learned it. That’s when I enlisted. To get far away. Clear my head. Then I met Joanie.”</p><p class="p1">In the silence that came after, Cormoran wondered what about that story applied to him. “Er,” he started. “How does that help me, Ted?”</p><p class="p1">He gestured around his surroundings as though that was the point. “Look around you, boy, I’m still here. In a town that wasn’t always the kindest to me. You, growing up with Ilsa. Me, fifty years later, still mates with the Hammets. Time, my boy,” Ted clasped Cormoran’s shoulder. “That’s all there is. Give it time and you’ll see.”</p><p class="p1">“See what?” Cormoran knotted his eyebrows.</p><p class="p1">Ted shrugged, now trimming a bush that needed no trimming. “You tell me.”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran chuckled, still unsure if his uncle’s purpose was only to distract and cheer him with that story, but he felt very fond of Ted then, even though he definitely used to give less vague pronouncements. Must be the vicar’s influence.</p><p class="p1">“So… give it time?” he repeated, trying to imagine what that would achieve other than an infant he wouldn’t know the first thing to do with.</p><p class="p1">“And try.”</p><p class="p1">“Try…” Cormoran repeated, thinking now that his uncle might’ve been replaced by Yoda.</p><p class="p1">Busying himself with cutting a rose that certainly ought to not be cut, Ted asked. “When was the last time you tried, Cormoran?”</p><p class="p1">“I try!” he retorted immediately, thinking his life was nothing but trials.</p><p class="p1">Ted shook his head. “With a woman, Corm? <em>Really</em> tried? Made an effort?”</p><p class="p1">And then his sagely and nonsensical uncle walked right away from him towards the vicar who had gone out of the church, to hand her the single rose he cut.</p><p class="p1">Baffled as he might’ve been, he took his uncle’s advice to heart: he tried.</p><p class="p1">He tried and very quickly he found that Kerenza was not at all a hardship to be with. Kind and caring, but never imposing. The way she pulled people in was by being open and gentle with them. “You never know what they’re going through,” she told him once of her life philosophy. And he could tell she meant it.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">He once was staring at her still-flat stomach, trying to get to grips with what it contained and he averted his eyes as though caught out looking at something he wasn’t meant too when he saw she was looking at him.</p><p class="p1">When they got dressed, they sat at her dining table and she told him, “I know this isn’t what you planned,” she started, holding his hand with both of hers on the table. “But I want this.”</p><p class="p1">“I know you do.”</p><p class="p1">“If you can’t be there, just tell me, will you? I just need to know if I have to prepare to do this on my own.”</p><p class="p1">He didn’t know how to answer that, if he was being honest. What he heard was that he was being given an out. And then he thought of Ted, and how he had gone up and down the country to find him and Lucy, and fight for them, and protect them when he didn’t have to. And if Ted so willingly stepped up as a father when he didn’t have to, how could he walk away from someone who would be of him? Of his blood?</p><p class="p1">Time, Ted had also said. In time, if he tried, he may perhaps learn to love Kerenza. Learn to be a father.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Robin was wearing a headband with antlers on it, which was not at all congruent with the sad look on her face. “What’s wrong?”</p><p class="p1">“Nothing.” she said, looking faraway, which told Cormoran it was Sam-related. And then, perking up likely to get him off the subject she asked, “What are your plans for Christmas?”</p><p class="p1">“Just home to Cornwall. You two going up to Masham?”</p><p class="p1">She looked like she regretted bringing it up when the question was thrown back at her, but only said, “Nothing set in stone so far.”</p><p class="p1">It was like an itch under his skin, wanting to ask how bad Barclay was fucking up that’s gotten her so upset. On occasion, he still imagined giving him one of his legendary Strike Specials.</p><p class="p1">“Bit of a longer break this time.” he said, trying so hard to cheer her up or get her mind off of Barclay.</p><p class="p1">She only nodded wanly, rolling the craft bead bracelet she’s been wearing most of the year under her fingers.</p><p class="p1">Out of ideas, he took an antler headband and put it on, grabbed for the clown nose and wore that, too. “Robin.”</p><p class="p1">That got him a smile.</p><p class="p1">“Can I take a photo?” she requested, cheeky.</p><p class="p1">“Okay, but that’ll be your Christmas present.”</p><p class="p1">Bigger grin. And she did take a photo. He looked like a put upon reindeer monster, but she was laughing so he was glad.</p><p class="p1">That same afternoon, when Robin stepped out for coffee, Sam slipped in the inner office looking like shit. He really didn’t want to get into personal stuff at the office, but he knew Sam knew better than that, so this must be about work, and if he knew Sam’s predicament, it would be about <em>more</em> work.</p><p class="p1">“The Sungsung case,” he started. “A think the woman will be stayin’ put. A can—”</p><p class="p1">Cormoran would hand him his paycheque if he knew Sam would take it.</p><p class="p1">“The husband just rang, they’re definitely off to Vienna for the holidays.”</p><p class="p1">“Whan are they leavin’ then, ‘cause A coud run surveillance—” Sam replied with an insistent energy, sitting now on Robin’s chair.</p><p class="p1">Cormoran sighed. “We’re done for the year, mate.” He doesn’t remember if he’s ever called Sam ‘mate’ before.</p><p class="p1">Sam hung his head.</p><p class="p1">“Listen Sam, if it’s money, I could loan—”</p><p class="p1">He shook his head and Cormoran didn’t bother to finish, watching as Sam ran his palms against his scalp in frustration. Cormoran realised that some of his fondness for Robin might’ve tacked onto him too. He wanted to help him so bad now, and wished Sam would take it.</p><p class="p1">With a heaving sigh, Sam said, “Can A ask a favor then?”</p><p class="p1">“Name it.”</p><p class="p1">“Coud ye ring Hardy for me?”</p><p class="p1">He didn’t need to say it. He knew what Sam was asking now and it sucked the cheer from him. The bloody year kept throwing him curveballs after curveballs, but this might be the biggest. And that was saying something.</p><p class="p1"><em>Oh no, you don’t, </em>he thought selfishly. Possessively.</p><p class="p1">A hail mary. Because a gambling problem or a drug problem to Cormoran at that moment seemed solvable, he asked, “Are you in trouble?”</p><p class="p1">Sam laughed mirthlessly. “A’m just poor, mate! A’ve run oot o’ options!”</p><p class="p1">And then, Sam cast his eyes down, biting his lip. “If it was only me, A’d live on the street just tae stay. But Maisie—”</p><p class="p1">He gets it. Very close now to meeting his own son, Cormoran gets it.</p><p class="p1">“Alright,” he said. “I’ll ring Hardy.”</p><p class="p1">He gave a huff of relief, but then put his face in his hands and Cormoran knew they were both now thinking of the same person: Robin.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hurt me to hurt my bb Sam way more than it hurt putting Corm thru the ringer lol.</p><p>Not long now, folks!</p><p>Thanks for the comments and the kudos and the losing of collective shit on the Denmark Street discord! They are food for the fic writer. Moar foods moar updates. Not long now! What will happen next!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Sam</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Dedicated to BadlyWiredLamp who asked a very good question:</p><p> </p><p>  <i>"How the hell do you learn to love someone you ought to love when you're still in the orbit of your soulmate?"</i></p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>All things considered, this wasn’t really one of the best year of Sam’s life or anything. Just easy to forget with Rob and all.</p><p>But all the other shit’s catching up with him now.</p><p>Maisie was sat on his lap, flipping through a picture book of fruits. She’s humming a little to herself and it’s so goddamn cute he doesn’t know what to do with himself. He spots a big picture of a banana. Maisie loves bananas, but he doesn’t ask her to identify it. Doesn’t ask her to name any of the other fruits like he supposed he ought to be doing.</p><p></p><div>
  <p>Everything’s an opportunity for learning, so all the parenting books say, but he can’t bear it if she doesn’t say anything back again. Near four now and they can count her words by the handful.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He kisses the back of her beautiful head, allowing her careless sing-song hum to be the only thing in his mind, sweeping under the rug all the things she needs and he couldn’t provide for her if only for a little while.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Time for bed, chicken.” says Aileen, holding out a hand and Maisie hops off her da's lap obediently and holds her mum’s hand and allows her to take her to the tiny flat’s single bedroom.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em>So much for escape.</em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p>It was a little early for Maisie’s bedtime, which Sam took to mean Aileen needed to talk about something, which Sam also took to mean as an imminent fight.</p>
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  <p>Why is his life such shit? He whined to himself, rubbing his palm roughly through his scalp and face. Then he thought of Robin and how very much not shit what they had going.</p>
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  <p>Before Aileen could ruin his night, he rings her.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Answer on the first ring. “Hiya babes,” she sounded cheerful and a little distracted.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“What are ye up tae?”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Folding laundry.” then she giggles. “You?”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Just puttin' Maisie tae bed. Aileen wants a chat. Can A come round after?”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“If you pick me up some detergent, you can even spend the night.” she joked, voice dropping in a playfully sexy way. He sighs. <em>I'm going to marry this girl</em>, he thinks.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He was about to give a cheeky quip himself, but Aileen walks back in and the look on her face reminded Sam of his present reality. So he only says, “See ye soon, love.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He waited for Robin’s goodbye-- which had been her brand of detergent, and a quick, “Love you.” before she clicked off.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Robin?” Aileen asked unnecessarily.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Yep. Stayin' ower at hers tonight gin ye don’t think you’d neit me.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“No problem. Ma shift isn’t until late tomorrow, A can take Maisie tae therapy.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>They don’t fight about Maisie. Not about daily logistics like that. They don’t keep score--or at least Sam doesn’t think Aileen does. They know what needs doing and whoever can do it will do it. It’s money they fight about. Effin’ money.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“The therapy needs payin'.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Rankles his insides hearing about impending due bills like that, especially when he’s only got a tenner left in his pocket and a bit of that’s going to detergent, apparently.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“A’ll take care o't.” he says, which is what he always says, and which is what he always does. No other choice, is there?</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Aileen sighed, “Tomorrow, Sam.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>His eyes bulged at that. Where’s he going to get a couple of hundred quid by tomorrow when it’s 7 in the evening now.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“They’re gaun'ae refer us tae a different ane gin we can’t make payment an' Maisie’s finally makin' real progress--”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He asks how much she has, he tells her how much he has. Feels very much like smashing a piggy bank to count every last penny just to pay for your next meal.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>They could just meet it, but then that doc will need paying again in a month, and then there were other bills and other things and all these endless responsibilities that just keep piling and piling until he was sure he’d be buried alive under it.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He can’t ask Strike and Rob for more work because Rob will only offer to give him money again. He’d have to get a second job that will somehow be okay with him fucking off to elsewhere with the agency’s unpredictable rota. That’ll be it for the little free time he has for Maisie and Robin.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Talked tae ma sister,”said Aileen after a stretch of silence as the pair of them realised how much they were drowning financially. “Says the private schools are aye lookin' for teachers. I’d have better luck findin' teachin' work in Edinburgh than here.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“W--” he started, about to protest.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“We aye says we’d gae wherever we think we coud give Maisie a better life,” Aileen says as though he needed reminding. “It isn’t London anymore, Sam. We can’t afford it!” she half-laughed as though them trying to make it in London had been a deeply daft thing to do. (It might have been.)</p>
</div><div>
  <p>They moved to London originally because Sam couldn’t get much work after the PTSD. Then, Strike giving him a call had been a grace from God. But Aileen had struggled getting anything better than shift work and the odd tutorial gig and their family--their situation--has far outgrown what he could reach with his agency salary.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“A don’t want tae leave, Aileen.” he says, voice quiet. Leaving out what he really meant: <em>I don't want to leave her.</em></p>
</div><div>
  <p>But Aileen reaches over and squeezes his knee sympathetically, knowing precisely what he meant. “She might come, Sam, if ye ask.”</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Aileen knew this was a done deal, of course. That she was getting her way. That he would rather jump off the Thames than live away from Maisie. She was absolutely right on that front. The only reason they weren’t packing for home right now was Robin.</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>“What’s wrong?” Robin asked gently, when Sam enveloped her in a large and tight hug right there on her front door. Just seeing Rob, holding her, balm to his frayed nerves.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He loosened his hug to kiss her. The sort that left no ambiguity about how he feels for her, what he wants from her. And she gives as good as she gets. And it melts him, how he could feel she wants him just as much, loves him just as much.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He’s in her room before he knew it. On her bed, before he knew it. Inside of her before he knew it. Losing himself in the way she yields for him, the way she’s soft and warm and sweet under him.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>“I love ye,” he breathes, his mouth to her bare chest, one hand pinning both hers overhead, the other clutching at her hip firm as he pistons slow and hard into her. “Ah, fuck, A love ye.” And he feels it. The moment she, too, loses herself in this carnal grace they’re sharing.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He collapses on top of her afterwards. Spent. Panting as he rests his sweaty head on top of her heaving chest. She laughs. Gentle hand through his hair. "I love you, Sam." She sighs it, like coming home after a long day. Like he was home to her.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He pulls up to look at her still flushed face. "Even though A'm dirt poor?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Her expression widens with shock. "You mean you're not some secret Scottish oligarch?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He chuckles, settling his head back against her chest, unwilling yet to move away from being sprawled over her, their naked bodies sticky with sweat and heat and more.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Do you want to tell me about it?"she offers.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He doesn't answer. Not yet. One more minute. Two more minutes before he lets her in on how truly shit his life was.</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>They made it near a year before their first huge fight. Happened right before the holidays. He didn't know which one of the pair of them he was more mad at. Aileen for asking Robin at all, or Robin for giving Aileen money and not telling him.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He found out when he went round to the therapist, planning to charm or prostrate himself at the lady's office for her not to kick out his four year old in her fancy speech therapy program. But the baffled assistant assured him fees have been settled and for a split second he thought it might've been a Christmas miracle.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I was going to tell you!" Robin said in defence when he confronted her at home. He was practically living at hers by then. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Yeah? Before or after ye gave ma ex-wife the money?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Would you have taken it if I told you before I did it?" she slung back.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>(No, he wouldn't have.) "Yeah!" he lied, angry.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She narrowed her eyes at him. That was a first. "Bullshit." and then she was off, in a way he'd only ever heard with Strike at the receiving end, defending to the death something she did where she was partly, on balance, at fault. "No one thinks you're a charity case, Sam! We all just want to fucking help you. Because we're your friends. I'm your bloody girlfriend, I'm allowed to effin' help you!"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"What aboot next month then?"he couldn't help but say to make his own point that he needs a more long-lasting solution than a hand out here and there. "The ane after thon? What about the next year?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>And a little confused and frazzled, Robin said, "Sure! Sam--Jesus, just let me help. I want to help!"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He felt utterly defeated. Drained. Slumping on her couch. Holding out his hand, and even angry she took it and let him pull her to sit next to him. She leaned against him and he kissed the back of her head and he felt her relax against him. He, too, was relaxing.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"It doesnae end, Rob."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She shifts to look at his face, cupping it in her warm and gentle palm. "I know."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"It's bloody London. If Maisie didnae need aw the other things--"he shook his head, incredulous with the hand life had dealt him and his beautiful child.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I know."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Hardy got back tae Cormoran." he said. He couldn't look at her then. "He has somethin' for me. Work."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She was quiet. He was nervous.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"In Edinburgh." </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Robin sat up. With her back to him, he couldn't see the look on her face. But she seemed to have clasped her hand to her lips. Sitting up with her, putting his arms around her he kissed her temple, by her ear, whispering,</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Come with me."</p>
</div>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>i love them so much. :( like when I think maybe I'm not some crazy barcott shipper, I start writing them and love them so much lololol.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Robin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They arrived at the Hardacres at the same time as Cormoran, who only mumbled, "Not up for this." when she asked, "Where's Kerry?" which told Robin he hadn't caught up his pal Graham about the latest in his life.</p><p>Near the end of the dinner, she would've preferred if it had been awkward instead of what it was, which was tense.</p><p>It started when Ruth Hardacre opened the door and after warmly greeting Cormoran asked him, "Is this <em>your</em> Robin?" which Robin could feel, standing next to Sam at the porch, put his back up immediately.</p><p>They knew just enough about Aileen to ask after her and Sam had to awkwardly say that they were getting divorced now. And then they apparently knew Cormoran well enough to know Lucy, who was apparently telling everyone with ears how perfect Cormoran and Robin were together.</p><p>"She's been trying to marry you off since the day we met, Oggy," Hardy was saying good-naturedly. "Remember? When I met her the first time and she asked if I've got a sister for you? She must be thrilled to know you've finally found your match."</p><p>It was awkward for Robin, who didn't know how to articulate that she was actually there as Sam's date, not Cormoran's. "Oh, we're actually not together." Robin said it in the end, pissed at Cormoran's intent on not being forthcoming of his <em>actual</em> personal life and throwing her under the bus. Sam, on the other hand, was just swallowing it down, which was understandable as he has a job on the line here.</p><p>"Oh. Oops." Hardy shrugged comically, the couple unaware of their effect to the three. Ruth, the wife, asked with an air of 'we're all close chums here' asked point blank, "Why not! You two look great together!"</p><p>"I'm seeing someone, Ruthie," Cormoran said finally. "We're actually, er, she's about seven months along now."</p><p>That stunned the table stupid. The Hardacre, because they seem to know Cormoran was the last person on earth to father a child, and Robin and Sam who had thought Cormoran would hack off his other leg than give personal information freely.</p><p>As far as Robin knew, everyone who knew about his impending baby found out from every other source except him.</p><p>When the men started talking army, Ruth invited Robin to the kitchen. She thought she was being coaxed to help fix them men their coffee and desserts, but Ruth led her out from the backdoor in the kitchen and into a nice sitting area with a garden.</p><p>They sat on a bench and Ruth asked if it was alright if she could smoke, offering Robin one, which she declined. "Sorry about that," Ruth apologised. "Should've caught on quicker you were here with Sam."</p><p>"That's okay," said Robin, and also wondered how Ruth figured it out.</p><p>"You know," Ruth started. "I'm glad you came in any case. I hoped you would, but knowing Cormoran, he'd know immediately if I expressed any interest."</p><p>"Sorry?"</p><p>Ruth smiled. "I'm Superintendent of the Edinburgh PD."</p><p>This surprised Robin because Ruth came off as a rich, kept woman. Ruth seemed to register her surprise. "I know." she winked. "Bet everyone's just as shocked when they hear you're a top PI."</p><p>"I don't know about top--"</p><p>"Don't be so modest!" Ruth protested. "Us women, we have to tell the boys we're on top of fields they think are theirs."</p><p>Robin realised she liked Ruth. She found overt empowerment very likable in women.</p><p>"We've been keeping an eye on you, you know." she said. "Won't be surprised if we're not the only ones. Laing. Chiswell. Beattie. Those were big cases, my dear. Huge. PIs never solve proper cases. Never. They never want them! Too much work, too little money. But you--"</p><p>"It isn't just me--"</p><p>"No, we know," said Ruth reassuringly. "Oggy's the best of the best. But <em>you</em>--we can use someone like you in my squad. Young, sharp mind. Fresh. I run the Undercover unit and you look like you can pass for anywhere between twenty-one to thirty five and that matters in my line of work."</p><p>Robin doesn't know what to say to this.</p><p>"Oggy's gonna kill me because he loves you, but I thought if a talent like this girl who took on the Shacklewell Ripper is even spending a minute on domestic dispute clients, it's a damn shame. Thought I owed it to her to let her know the world is her oyster." then she asked, "Have any formal training? Combat? Took a shooting course maybe? What did you do at uni?"</p><p>It suddenly felt like a job interview, and one Robin was stunned to realise she felt fortunate to be having. "Counter Surveillance Course. Corm put me on a Detective Course when I first started helping him out in cases. Defensive Driving, Self-Defense. Psychology at uni, but I didn't--"</p><p>"You're hired." said Ruth, stubbing her cigarette.</p><p>"I didn't finish uni."</p><p>"That doesn't matter to us if it doesn't matter to you. You've got a CV more impressive than the detective gardas we <em>do</em> have. You'd be on patrol in uniform for six months, that's just the way it goes, but that should give you enough time to get a lay of the land, teach you other copper-specific skills. You'll be in plainclothes and the detective track by this time next year."</p><p>She makes it sound so easy, Robin thought. And somehow Robin thought it would be. She could imagine herself in a button down and trousers, badge on her hip like a telly detective. She's got a gun, but doesn't need to use it. Solving life or death cases. Always. None of the adulterers that was her current bread and butter. Fulfilling her little girlhood dream of helping. Always helping.</p><p>If they had this conversation last year, Robin would've said no outright.</p><p>"Can I think about it?" This was also what she told Sam a few days ago when he asked.</p><p>Ruth smiled, handing her a card. "I was fully expecting you to turn me down outright. More than I could ask for, your answer."</p><p>Back home, Sam asked excitedly, "She offerit ye a job, didnae she? Strike wis no keen whan Ruth took ye away. It'll be a guid ane, A bet. A'm surprisit it hasnae happen't before now, someone poachin' ye."</p><p>It has happened once or twice in the last couple of years, as a matter of fact. Eric Wardle had been in hot pursuit for some time like he was getting a commission for the referral. A few months back, Saul Morris had rang saying Mitch Patterson was prepared to double her salary if she, as he put it, 'came over to the dark side'. </p><p>The Met had asked at the wrong time. At the time when she had chosen her job, had chosen the agency even over her own marriage. There was no chance in hell she'd allow herself anywhere near the pigs at Patterson's agency so that was DOA.</p><p>This offer was different. This was working for Ruth, whom she decided she liked. This was working undercover as a hotshot cop. This was staying with Sam and being with Sam.</p><p>What's there left for her in London, really? The agency, sure, but that other job had its own allure, too. Her flat? She can get another one, she's used to moving by now. Friends? </p><p>Her phone rang. Cormoran. </p><p>"It's Kerry. He's--" his voice sounded strained. Robin's stomach was in knots.</p><p>"Is everything alright?"</p><p>"Could you come?" Cormoran asked. "At hospital? Now?"</p><p>"Yeah. Yeah, what do you need?" she asked, already picking up her purse and walking away from Sam who she had left hanging.</p><p>"Nothing, just you."</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>He came early. Too early. But he was fine.</p><p>It was Robin who wasn't fine, looking at the tiny angry-looking baby behind the viewing window.</p><p>He was real. He was here. Now. In front of her.</p><p>Baby Boy Strike, it said on the little card. </p><p>She felt guilty, because she's supposed to only feel joy at her friend becoming a father. But she only felt jealous and defeated and heartbroken. It had felt too late before. Many times. All of the times, it had felt too late. But this time, with him--</p><p>Irrevocable him. Here.</p><p>Far, far too late.</p><p>She bit her quivering lip, unable to keep from crying. Wishing she loved this little boy who was half Cormoran, but stupidly, selfishly, confusedly, she could only think of the other half. The half that was someone else. That was not her.</p><p><em>I can't be here</em>, she thinks about the hospital, and London. Feelings welling up like vomit at her throat. </p><p>She walked away. Left the hospital without saying goodbye. They have made choices in the last year that they can no longer take back. What was one more?</p><p>She rang Ruth in the car, saying she will need a few weeks to tie up loose ends. She won't spring this up on Cormoran. Not yet, but soon. Tonight, he deserves to think only of his famil--</p><p>That's when she broke down. In her car, at the hospital parking lot she sobbed. </p><p>He had been herfamily in London. Denmark Street had been her home. Their partnership had been her life.</p><p>She bawled in Sam's arms. All night. Unambiguously sad and heartbroken. And he only held her and said, "It's okay." Over and over, "It's okay."</p><p>She knew he meant that it was okay that she was unhappy. That she was desperately sad. That she still felt for Cormoran feelings she ought no longer feel. "It's okay, love," he cooed. "We'll start over. Ye an' me."</p><p>And they did.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I honestly didn't think this entire story was going to be this dramatic, but I loved it. I loved feeling <i>something</i>, you know?</p><p>When I was writing this story, I wanted stakes. High, high stakes. I wanted it to feel real, to feel different. </p><p>I thought I was also kidding when I started shipping Robin and Sam, but lol it turns out I meant it! I know it will never happen in canon (or will it? lol) but in the infinite universes where Cormoran and Robin fall madly in love and end happily ever after, there must be one out there where she gets to be happy with Sam. So this is that story.</p><p>Thank you for all your comments, really. I enjoyed every single one of them. (pls srss can I have some moar?)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Three Years Later</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She suggested a pub called The World's End. Not intentional, Robin would later insist. She picked it because it was two minutes away from her office and she was hoping to make it back before the medical examiner left for the day. That damn ME, Quigley, liked it when the D's chased after him like a blushing schoolgirl.</p><p>"Ellacott!" Barked the gaff. She only had the self-restraint not to check her watch, wondering how late this was going to make her, but not enough self-restraint not to exchange a knowing look with her partner. "Bring Buchanan with you!"</p><p>"Ah, shit." her partner, Joel Buchanan, mumbled, getting off his swivel chair and falling into step with Robin. "How hard a bollocking do you think we'll get?" Buchanan whispered to her conspiratorially. She giggled. They were in heaps of trouble, but the gaff was always pissed if he's about to go on a press conference and they don't have anything as good as the bad guy in handcuffs.</p><p></p><div>
  <p>They sat there and took their bollocking. Trying to keep a straight face as their red-faced boss yelled at them about what was at stake as though they were rookies straight out of training. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Their current--big, massive, huge--case was a peace retreat gone wrong. Sweat lodge. Dozens of upper middle class 'yummy mummies' dead from asphyxiation. Cult leader gone underground. It only happened three days ago, but somehow the gaff expected the cult leader behind bars yesterday.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I could use a pint," Buchanan asked. "What do you say?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Plans." she said simply.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Hot date?" he asked, even though he knew it wasn't.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Potential source. Has experience with our suspect when he was down in Norfolk."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Can I come with, then?" Buchanan sat up, braced and excited.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Give me half an hour with him. Warm him up."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joel asked seriously, "Need backup?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Robin grinned, but shook her head. "I'll be fine. I've got judo moves." she winked</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"That you do, Ellacott. Off you go then."</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p>* * *</p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p>"Jesus," Cormoran muttered, seeing the female figure that was unmistakably Robin walking in the direction of the pub he was at. To him, she looked changed. Thinner, which doesn't surprise him. CID? She must be working to the bone. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Even in the way she carried herself, she had changed. She seemed a little hardened somehow. More intentional in the speed and weight of her steps. Long green coat billowing behind, revealing beneath dark blouse and trousers. He welled with pride, knowing what's become of her when she left. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Thirty-four year-olds make Detective Sargeants all the time, but not in five years starting from zero. She must have been exceptional to rise that far that fast. He knew that, of course.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She looked older. More her age. Suited her.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>They pressed cheeks by way of hello. They were meant to be friends, after all. They haven't seen each other in three years, but what they had can't be touched by time.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You got a haircut," he said, because she did. It was shorter now. Just by her collar bone. She also seemed to have had her hair colored. It was a deeper red now when it used to be golden.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She laughed. "I've had hundreds of them."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Colored your hair." he pointed out.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You really are London's top detective, aren't you?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He chuckled at that.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I was undercover for a bit." she said. The only thing she said about the matter.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Suits you." he tells her, unable to help himself. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>She doesn't react to that, only asked. "How's Taran?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Oh, you know," he said, still unsure how to be this sort of parent. The sort that talks about their kid. He doesn't think Robin would find it very interesting the things he find interesting about his three-year-old, like how he's so far proudest that he's made an Arsenal fan of him, so he only says, "Good. Big now."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I still can't believe you named him Taran," Robin grinned. And her wide grin reminded him of before times. "Taran Strike."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Cormoran rolled his eyes, amused and exasperated. He knew this was going to happen, but Kerenza wanted a Cornish name and thought it was clever and interesting to name a boy with the last name 'Strike' a first name that literally meant 'Thunder'. "I know! But it suits him. Zipping around underfoot. Lost half my body weight running around after him."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"How's Kerry?" Robin asked for it was the natural thing to ask.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Good." he said. Should he tell her? Will that change things? What if it does? About to open his mouth, she beat him to the punch.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You two together how long now? Three and a half years?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Only got as far as fifteen months." he said. He doesn't know why he chose to say it this way. She knotted her eyebrows and then comprehension dawned.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Oh. I'm sorry." she said.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He shrugged. He wondered if they'll ever be close enough for him to tell her what happened. He had been all in, too. She was the mother of his child--but Kerry is a brilliant woman. Far too brilliant to stick around and be anyone's second place. The irony was that he had loved her by the end. Tried, like what Ted had said. But that was his lot, to be unlucky in love.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"And Sam?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The way she looked at him, he knew.</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p>* * *</p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p> </p>
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  <p>When Joel joined them, Cormoran was his usual matter-of-fact self. The way Cormoran treated them both, like coppers he's not sure he ought to be helpful for, amused Robin. She also kind of liked how he was treating her like a cop. Not his protege. Not all the other things they are or were to each other, but as a cop. A proper detective.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He told them that he was no longer in touch with anyone they may have come across in that commune in Norfolk, but he knew people who might be. They were good leads. One of them was even a name they already came across. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Could you chase after Quigley for the tox report for me?" she whispered to Buchanan as she and her partner left Cormoran who was finishing off a pint.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Why?" Joel half-whined.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Coz. C'mon, Joel. I'm knackered. My source just gave us half a dozen solid leads for the cult leader. You owe me."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joel cracked a playful smile. "Taking him home are you? You can just say so. 'Bout time you went out after Sam--"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"It isn't like that," Robin insisted. "Just want to see him off, is all. Please, Joel? Please, for me?" she squeezed his arm, batted her eyes. Joel rolled his eyes. "Okay, but if Quigley asks for your number to trade for the rush on that report, I'm giving it."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Okay, but my work one!" she called after Joel who was chuckling, already returning to the office.</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>* * *</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>This time, there was no more waiting. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Just as Robin was about to walk inside the pub, she found the doorway blocked by Cormoran's bulk, forcing her to step back into the side walk. He pressed her against the side of the doorway, just so to keep from blocking any paths, and right there, outside The World's End in Edinburgh, he had cupped the side of her neck, gripped at her waist, and kissed her.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>It was a physical thing. Far more physical than a first kiss ought to be. At that moment, neither of them felt anything other than release. Pressure-cookers in human form finally letting out steam.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>It was the size of him that made it real for Robin. Big, bear-like, firm, but the way he was touching her had gentility to it. Restraint--even though they were sucking face outside her local right before happy hour.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>For Cormoran, it was her smell. Narciso. Still Narciso. A scent he considered theirs somehow. He didn't know how much he missed the smell of it until he smelled it again now.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Where do you live?" he asked, and they hailed a cab near immediately, still only untangling their mouths for breath and instruction to the indifferent cabbie. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>They made it as far as her bed. As far as her feeling him hard as he ground himself against her, the both of them still fully clothed, still with their coats on. She was the one who wrenched her face away, panting. "I still love Sam."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Okay." this doesn't seem to deter him, moving to her neck.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Somehow, she laughed at that. "Did you hear me."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Still love Sam." he murmured against her skin.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Cormoran-- Cormoran!" she twists away when he licked a stripe up her neck, large palm kneading a tit. Thats when he stopped. They looked at each other and he pulled off of her and fell back on her mattress.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She sat up, mildly glad she had the sense to hit pause before they made a mess of her dry clean only attire.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We have terrible timing, don't we?" she said.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Cormoran laughed.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She told him earlier before Joel joined them what had happened. It ended six months ago but it still felt quite fresh. Robin was blindsided the first time he proposed. Two years in, he had gotten down on one knee and she had told him she never wanted to marry again. Anybody. Didn't get the need for it anymore, the way both of theirs ended anyway and they only had to be saddled with expensive and gutting divorces. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>And for a time it was alright, until it wasn't. It got hard because they figured out they weren't on the same page. To stay together would mean someone will have to give, and they couldn't bear a life built on resentment. Like a cliche, Robin thought, she loved Sam too much for that.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Do you want sex?" she asked Cormoran.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Yes please." he said, she could feel the tips of his fingers making piano of the small of her back. She laughed.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I mean, do you want just sex?" Because she'd do it. She'd want it. She was curious. Cormoran Strike. Top PI. Best friend of old. Ex-something of hers. Fuck yeah, she was curious.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Oh, then no." he said immediately.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She looked over her shoulder at him then.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>And with tender eyes, older now--one of those bastards who is growing more handsome with age--he sighs, "I love you, Robin."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We haven't seen each other in three years." she points out.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I know." he says. "Still true, though." Then he sits up.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I still love him, Corm." she sighs.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He nods. "Okay." and then, "I'll wait."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Corm--"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Ring me if you're ready, yeah?" he says, already on her door. "Don't care if it's tomorrow or another ten years. Just ring, yeah?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I work here! I love my job!"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He seemed to look around her room and then shrugged. "Are there cheating bastards in Edinburgh?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Plenty of them."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Sounds like I've got market demand."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"And Taran?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"He's a quarter Scottish, I'll have you know."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Is he?" Robin asked stunned and surprised. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Cormoran grinned. "Got me a little Glaswegian lad. He's there now. With Kerry's family."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You will move your son and his mum and your business to Edinburgh?" she gaped, wanting him to hear how ridiculous he sounds.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"If this is where you are, then yeah." Cormoran shrugged.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I don't want to get married." said Robin. "Ever."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Good."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I don't want children."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He stopped short. "What about mine?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"It's still just the one, right?" she asked, a little uneasy.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>He laughed. "Yeah, just the one."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Well, then he's alright." she said as though they were deliberating who can and who cannot come to the picnic. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Anything else?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Robin seemed to think.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"No?" Cormoran confirmed. "You good?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>She nodded, still a little baffled by this conversation.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Okay. So just ring me when you're ready and I'll be here for the sex and all the rest of it--"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Robin laughed.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Alright. Better head. Ring me."</p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em>The End</em>
  </p>
</div>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>SURPRISEEEEE</p><p>I hope for everyone who tuned in and kept on their toes how this was possibly going to end that this was cathartic for you to read. </p><p>Tell ur friends. Leave comments. xx</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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